Is Journalism Worth Dying For__ Final Dispatches - Anna Politkovskaya [203]
I am ashamed today to be Russian because of Chechnya, the anti-Georgian campaigns, and the Russian nationalist processions. I am ashamed to be Russian Orthodox because the Church made no attempt to protect its brother Georgians, and because it will never canonise Anna Politkovskaya who, in its stead, comforted and interceded for the helpless. I am ashamed to be a native of St Petersburg because those 200 people who came to the meeting in memory of Anna Politkovskaya were even fewer than the number of journalists murdered in the post-Soviet period, and also because the courts of Petersburg acquit the killers of “non-Russians.” What does that leave? It leaves just one thing: to continue to be a human being. “Not to bow down before the times, but to be the brains of your age, to be a human being,” as the poetess Sofia Parnok wrote in an equally hopeless era in the last century.
Today it is 40 days since Anna died, and I will again light candles. Anna Politkovskaya had the strength and courage to be a human being. May I be able to do the same!
Vladimir Ryzhkov, Deputy of the State Duma
I am shocked. It seems unbelievable. At this moment in time Politkovskaya was probably one of the best-known journalists not only in Russia but in the entire world. She received numerous international awards for her work. In its repercussions this murder is comparable with the murders of Yury Shchekochikhin and Vlad Listiev.
I find the motives completely obvious. All these years Anna Politkovskaya concentrated principally on Chechnya, Beslan and Nord-Ost, that is, the topics most disagreeable to Russia’s rulers, the FSB and the Army. Any of these organizations might have commissioned this crime. I frankly do not believe it will be solved, because those with an interest in her death are precisely the people who are to conduct the investigation. I hope nevertheless that a miracle will occur and that the killers will be found.
Russia is becoming an ever more dangerous country for independent journalists and opposition politicians. None of us is immune to a similar fate.
Mikheil Saakashvili, President of Georgia
She was one of the greatest friends of our country. In recent years she wrote excellent articles about Georgia. In Russia many decent people have come forward to protest at her killing, the first time that has happened on such a scale. I am filled with admiration and thank those people.
Gennadiy Seleznyov, Deputy of the State Duma
I grieve together with the Novaya gazeta team at the death of Anna Politkovskaya. For us she was a highly professional journalist, an honest person and a great colleague. I had the privilege of being closely acquainted with Anna, and I know she was a true citizen of our country. It is patently obvious that she was killed for telling the truth, because of her conscience, and her desire to change our life for the better.
Liza Umarova [Chechen singer], with profound sorrow, on behalf of the Chechens and Ingushes
On October 7 a disgraceful, cynical and cowardly shot from round the corner was fired at a woman from whose writing we learned the truth. Anna Politkovskaya! This fine, proud name we, Chechens and Ingushes, always pronounced with more reverence and admiration than any other name we had spoken for over 50 years. She represented the honor and conscience of Russia, and probably nobody will ever know the source of her fanatical courage and love of the work she was doing. She was a journalist like no other working today. She loved Russia so much that she turned down the opportunity of going to live and work in America, in security, in peace and quiet. “Novaya gazeta still needs me,” she said. On this holy Muslim festival of Ramadan, we