• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

We part, having got nowhere.

During the afternoon Victor Ognyov, the Deputy Prosecutor of Ryazan, makes a surprising announcement: he says a criminal investigation was launched yesterday, November 4, at 19:10 hours, rather than at 11:30 on November 5 as Colonel Mzhavanadze was assuring us just a couple of hours ago.

“The militia are saying something quite different. Who should we believe?”

“They simply did not know.” Ognyov imperturbably shuffles the papers in his file, where two separate directives about instigating one and the same case are visible to the naked eye. “We intervened operationally so that everything would move along more effectively. First we appointed Skrynnikov, a junior investigator, but now at my request a more experienced official will investigate the matter (Mikail Zotov, who was defending Kuznetsov against Komarov). We’re about to send a special report on all this to the Prosecutor-General’s Office in Moscow since, as you will agree, this is not a routine case. We are observing all the requirements of the Criminal Procedure Code.”

“But why is the charge merely ‘disturbing the peace’?”

“Because Komarov was neither killed nor robbed. There was no intention of killing him.”

“How can you be so sure? Do you know the person with the intentions?”

“We know if they had meant to they would have killed him, but they were merely giving him a fright. It will be a matter of minor physical injury affecting the victim’s health for a short time.”

“He hasn’t recovered yet!”

“You will forgive my remarking that there is no article in the Criminal Code relating to beating up a journalist.” Ognyov smiles sardonically.

Evening falls once more. Misha is lying in one of the narrow beds typical of an underfunded Russian hospital. His head is bandaged and he looks pale. His mother has brought in all the medicine, bandages and syringes he needs because as usual there are none in the neurosurgical department. No doctors or nurses in the evenings either, but luckily Valentina is a nurse herself. Komarov is holding forth to his neighbours about democracy, the duty of the mass media, and the need to be unflinching in the fight against corruption which spoils life for everyone. His neighbours listen sullenly, either because of their own ailments or because they have little faith in the victory of democracy or in the need to make the effort Misha is describing. Sitting on the edge of the next bed, Valentina lectures her son.

“Yes, I understand what you are saying, and I am not against your being a journalist, but you do need to be more careful.”

“We can’t give in, Mum,” Mikhail answers with the passion of one who will brook no compromise in the fight for good. He is in a state of post-traumatic euphoria, ready for the worst, fearing nothing. “Let them be afraid every week of what we are going to write about them, not we of them!”

“What are you going to do now, Misha?” I ask in parting.

“Carry on writing articles,” Komarov replies unyieldingly.

So, is it worth sacrificing your life for journalism? How does each of us make our choice?

Every successive attack on a journalist in Russia – and by tradition nobody ever gets caught – relentlessly reduces the number of journalists working because they want to fight for justice. The risks are very great and not everyone is up to the unremitting tension which accompanies this kind of work. As the numbers of one kind of journalist fall, so there is an increase in the number of those who prefer undemanding journalism, reporting which doesn’t involve prying where you are not welcome.

Undemanding media cater for an undemanding public, ready to agree with everything it is told. The more there is of the former, the more monolithic the latter becomes, and the less opportunity society has of seeing what is wrong with the circumstances in which it lives.

In the last few months the situation has been deteriorating rapidly. It seems we are at a tipping point, and that soon the Government (the oligarchs, the FSB, the bureaucracy)