[Joint House and Senate Hearing, 115 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
115 Congress
1st Session Printed for the use of the
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Systematic Attacks on Journalists in Russia and Other Post-Soviet States
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
October 4, 2017
Joint Briefing of the
Comission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
and the House Freedom of the Press Caucus
________________________________________________________________________________________________
Washington: 2017
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
234 Ford House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
202-225-1901
[email protected]
http://www.csce.gov
@HelsinkiComm
Legislative Branch Commissioners
HOUSE SENATE
CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey ROGER WICKER, Mississippi,
Co-Chairman Chairman
ALCEE L. HASTINGS, Florida BENJAMIN L. CARDIN. Maryland
ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas
MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas CORY GARDNER, Colorado
STEVE COHEN, Tennessee MARCO RUBIO, Florida
RICHARD HUDSON, North Carolina JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire
RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois THOM TILLIS, North Carolina
SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas TOM UDALL, New Mexico
GWEN MOORE, Wisconsin SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island
Executive Branch Commissioners
DEPARTMENT OF STATE
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
DEPARTMEMT OF COMMERCE
(II)
ABOUT THE ORGANIZATION FOR SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE
The Helsinki process, formally titled the Conference on Security
and Cooperation in Europe, traces its origin to the signing of the
Helsinki Final Act in Finland on August 1, 1975, by the leaders of 33
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ABOUT THE COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE
The Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, also known as
the Helsinki Commission, is a U.S. Government agency created in 1976 to
monitor and encourage compliance by the participating States with their
OSCE commitments, with a particular emphasis on human rights.
The Commission consists of nine members from the United States
Senate, nine members from the House of Representatives, and one member
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(III)
Systematic Attacks on Journalists in Russia and Other Post-Soviet States
________________
October 4, 2017
Page
PARTICIPANTS
Hon. Steve Chabot, Co-Chair, House Freedom of the Press Caucus ............1
Hon. Adam Schiff, Co-Chair, House Freedom of the Press Caucus .............6
Jordan Warlick, Staff Associate, Commission on Security and
Cooperation in Europe .....................................................2
Thomas Kent, President and CEO, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty ...........3
Amanda Bennett, Director, Voice of America ................................5
Nina Ognianova, Europe and Central Asia Program Coordinator,
Committee to Protect Journalists ..........................................8
Karina Orlova, Washington, D.C. Correspondent, Echo of Moscow ............13
APPENDIX
Prepared Statement of Nina Ognianova .....................................23
(IV)
Systematic Attacks on Journalists in Russia and Other Post-Soviet States
----------
October 4, 2017
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
Washington, DC
The briefing was held at 3:09 p.m. in Room SVC-208, Senate Visitors
Center, Washington, DC, Hon. Steve Chabot, Co-Chair, House Freedom of
the Press Caucus, moderating.
Panelists present: Hon. Steve Chabot, Co-Chair, House Freedom of
the Press Caucus; Hon. Adam Schiff, Co-Chair, House Freedom of the
Press Caucus; Jordan Warlick, Staff Associate, Commission on Security
and Cooperation in Europe; Thomas Kent, President and CEO, Radio Free
Europe/Radio Liberty; Amanda Bennett, Director, Voice of America; Nina
Ognianova, Europe and Central Asia Program Coordinator, Committee to
Protect Journalists; and Karina Orlova, Washington, D.C. Correspondent,
Echo of Moscow.
Mr. Chabot. Things don't work as well here on the Senate side, so I
couldn't get the mic to work. [Laughter.] But good afternoon. On behalf
of the House Freedom of the Press Caucus, I want to thank the Helsinki
Commission, all of you, for being here. And I want to thank Congressman
Schiff as well. He and I restarted, as you may know, the caucus to draw
attention to international press freedom because a free and independent
press is a key ingredient to any functioning democracy. We must
continue to draw attention to this vital freedom around the globe.
Our friends at Voice of America, and at the Broadcasting Board of
Governors, the BBG, know well the importance of a free and independent
press in Russia, and throughout Eastern Europe for that matter. This is
a timely discussion. Congressman Schiff and I strongly agree that a
free and independent press in Russia and Eastern Europe is more
important now than ever. It's absolutely necessary to counter an
increasingly bold Vladimir Putin, who is attempting to undermine the
fourth estate.
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, many of the post-Soviet
states have embraced democracy, and with that, a free press. It's the
job of journalists to speak truth to power and hold governments
accountable to democratic ideals. As we all know, Mr. Putin is hellbent
on destroying the independent press. Why? Because it is a threat to his
very rule. And there's no question that Putin is bound and determined
to extend his power and influence to many now-free countries that were
once under the yoke of the former Soviet Union.
Looking further than Russia's actions in Ukraine, which demonstrate
that Putin will stop at nothing to reconstitute the former Russian
empire, destroying the free press is an integral part of his plan.
Putin has never really accepted or respected the sovereignty of our
ally Ukraine. After unilaterally invading Crimea, Putin held a staged
referendum to claim that Crimea wanted to leave Ukraine and become part
of Russia. Russian propaganda played a significant role in the
annexation, and still continues to do so.
More generally, Putin's propaganda machine provides cover for other
Russian sympathizers throughout Eastern Europe. His continued
manipulation of the press only leads to increased propaganda that is
used to give credibility to his allies throughout the region. And in
Russia itself, pro-Moscow voices are often the same voices that rely on
corruption and aim to silence dissent. That's why a strong, independent
and free press is a natural obstacle to Putin's grand strategy.
We must continue to support efforts by the BBG and VOA, the Voice
of America, to provide a balanced and comprehensive platform in the
region. By representing American democracy to the very populations
Putin aims to control, we are able to provide tools for independent
thought. This further cultivates support for independent journalism.
I'm pleased to see that programs like Radio Free Europe and Radio
Liberty are being given renewed attention by American policymakers like
myself. They broadcast in 28 languages to countries throughout Eastern
Europe, Russia and other distant parts of the globe. They give
independent journalists a voice where it's needed most.
These are precisely the kinds of broadcasters Western democracy
needs if we are to effectively halt Putin's ambitions. Putin must not
be allowed to win the battle of ideas in Eastern Europe. And he should
not be allowed to quash dissent at home. That's why I, along with my
colleagues in the House, continue to voice our support for a free and
independent press, both in Eastern Europe and in Russia.
We have an excellent panel here today to help us better understand
the situation on the ground and the challenges that journalists face in
Russia and throughout the former Soviet Union. I hope our panelists can
shed further light on this situation and provide some potential
solutions. And as I said, it is certainly a distinguished panel here
this afternoon. I'm sure that a whole lot will be learned by an awful
lot of people. And as I said, this is a very critical matter and it
couldn't be more timely.
So thank you very much, panel, for being here. And thank you all
for being here. [Applause.]
Ms. Warlick. And thank you, Representative Chabot.
To those in attendance, welcome and thank you for coming to this
joint briefing of the Helsinki Commission and the House Freedom of the
Press Caucus on ``Attacks Against Journalists in Russia and Other Post-
Soviet States.'' My name is Jordan Warlick, and I'm responsible for
media freedom issues at the Helsinki Commission. As some of you may
know, the Helsinki Commission was created to monitor compliance with
the principles of democracy and human rights enshrined in the Helsinki
Final Act of 1975.
When authoritarian regimes systematically attack and silence the
press, they violate these commitments. These kinds of attacks take many
forms--online and verbal harassment, physical assault, politically
motivated imprisonment, and even murder. There have been some
particularly disturbing cases so far this year. Russian journalist
Yulia Latynina fled Moscow after several attacks on her home. Well-
known Azerbaijani blogger Mehman Huseynov was jailed and severely
beaten in prison. Dmitry Popkov and Nikolai Andrushchenko were
tragically murdered for their work as journalists in Russia. However,
for the few well-known cases that garner attention, there are many more
lesser-known victims.
A free press is an indispensable part of democracy. It keeps
citizens informed and holds governments accountable. I look forward to
a discussion of the pressures journalists experience in the region, why
the situation has deteriorated, and what can be done to reverse these
troubling trends. We are grateful to have such distinguished panelists
with us here today, and we look forward to your insights on this
subject.
First, we'll hear from Tom Kent, president of Radio Free Europe/
Radio Liberty, who joins us all the way from RFE/RL's headquarters in
Prague. Before RFE/RL, Tom had an impressive 40-year career with the
Associated Press, where he served in roles including Moscow bureau
chief, international editor, world services editor, and standards
editor.
Following Tom, we have Amanda Bennett, director at Voice of
America. Amanda is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, with experience
at a number of publications, including most recently as executive
editor of Bloomberg News and editor of the Philadelphia Inquirer. As
director of VOA and a seasoned journalist herself, Amanda's very well
placed to discuss the dangers that confront the media.
Next we'll hear from Nina Ognianova, Europe and Central Asia
program coordinator at the Committee to Protect Journalists [CJP].
Leading advocacy work and fact-finding missions at CJP for 15 years,
Nina has exceptional regional expertise that will be very valuable to
our discussion today.
Finally, Karina Orlova will tell us her story. She is the
Washington, D.C. correspondent for Echo of Moscow, a regular
contributor to The American Interest, and has first-hand experience of
the dangers journalists face in the region.
We will conclude with a question and answer session. In addition to
questions from the audience, we may also be taking questions from
Facebook Live. And if you're tweeting at this event, please also use
our handle, #HelsinkiCommission and #InternationalPressFreedom.
I'd like to turn now to our first panelist, Tom Kent, who will
provide us with an overview of the situation for journalists in Russia
and the region, and the particular threats that RFE/RL journalists
face.
Tom, when you're ready.
Mr. Kent. Thank you, Jordan. Good afternoon, everyone. Certainly,
we welcome the reestablishment of the House Freedom of the Press Caucus
and the willingness of Representative Schiff and Chabot to serve as co-
chairs. And we thank the Helsinki Commission for its participation in
today's events.
Fair and representative societies simply cannot exist without
independent fact-based journalism. We do our best in difficult
circumstances. I am President and CEO of Radio Free Europe/Radio
Liberty, a private news corporation funded by Congress. We do local
news and investigative reporting in 23 countries. We're based in
Prague, right up against the time zones and the nations we serve--the
former Soviet Union, the Balkans, and Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
We work in 25 languages, on television, radio, the web, and social
networks.
The law requires RFE/RL to provide professional, independent news
reporting. At the same time, we promote freedom of expression, clean
government, and tolerance. These are universal values. Even
dictatorships acknowledge them, if only on paper. When societies are
open and just, when journalism is honest, the world benefits from more
understanding and less conflict. It follows that the rights and work of
journalists reporting the news must be respected, yet this is far from
the case. Perhaps because our reporters focus so much on human rights
and the scourges of corruption and extremism, RFE/RL's staff is under
pressure every day.
Our staff faces physical attack, threats to themselves and their
relatives, detention and imprisonment, and unrelenting assault from
government and extremist media. Yet we continue to provide something
our audience obviously wants. In the first half of this year, visits to
our websites were up 13 percent from the year before. People watched
our videos 380 million times on YouTube alone, almost twice as many as
in 2016. Much of our work is in the Russian-speaking world. Our
audiences there want news beyond what comes from Kremlin-controlled
media.
We look for viewers who favor clean government, economic freedom,
and better relations with the West. To this audience, we offered a
dozen different Russian-language news brands. They include the new
Current Time television and digital network, an RFE/RL project produced
in cooperation with VOA, 24/7 all in Russian. RFE/RL offers separate
news services for countries and regions throughout the post-Soviet
space not only in Russian, but with the authenticity of local languages
like Armenian, Georgian, Tajik and Kyrgyz, to name a few.
Inside Russia, we face severe limitations in TV and radio
distribution. This, despite the fact that Russian media distribute
freely in the United States. Still, millions of Russians follow our
content. Apparently, the authorities recognize our impact. We face
growing obstacles to our work. Our correspondents inside Russia have
been beaten and harassed. In Russian-controlled Crimea, our contributor
Mykola Semena was convicted just last week of treason-like charges and
banned from public activity for three years. In the Donbas region of
Ukraine, pro-Russian separatists are holding our contributor Stanislav
Aseyev, accusing him of espionage.
Moscow Television on some days accuses us of being master spies and
propagandists, on others of being boring and incompetent. Here's one
blast at us from Russian political commentator Dmitry Kiselyov.
[Video clip in Russian.]
Mr. Kent. And yet, despite the pressures, we continue to operate
with a bureau in Moscow and correspondents across the country. We have
been through hard times before. We trust we will endure even through
the latest trough in U.S.-Russian relations. It's important to note
that attacks on our work in post-Soviet nations are hardly limited to
Russia. In Ukraine, our investigative TV program, called ``Schemes,''
regularly reports on corruption. Last month, security agents attacked
``Schemes'' reporters covering a lavish wedding celebration, a private
event that appeared to make use of government resources. In a clip
we'll show you, you can hear our reporter, Mykhailo Tkach, the man with
the cellphone, shouting ``shcho ty robysh''--``what are you doing''--as
one of the agents forces our cameraman, Borys Trotsenko, to the ground.
[A video clip in Ukrainian is shown.]
Mr. Kent. Trotsenko got a concussion in that.
Also, in post-Soviet countries our contributor, Saparmamed
Nepeskuliev, is in his third year of imprisonment in Turkmenistan for
his reporting. RFE/RL is suing Azerbaijan in the European Court of
Human Rights in a case stemming from the forcible closure of our bureau
there in 2014. There are many other abuses of our bureaus and our
people.
Despite the many problems we face, we accomplish a lot. In every
country across our geographies, our local staff and contributors take
substantial risks, covering the news for their fellow citizens through
us. They believe in press and personal freedom. They know their work
has impact. I thank you for your support.
Ms. Warlick. Thank you very much, Tom, for your presentation and
those powerful videos. We very much admire the work that RFE/RL does in
that part of the world.
Amanda.
Ms. Bennett. Thank you, Jordan, and thank you to Representatives
Schiff and Chabot and the Freedom of the Press Caucus for convening
this briefing along with the Helsinki Commission.
I'd like to begin by sharing the experience of VOA journalist
Fatima Tlisova, who in 2007 was compelled to leave Russia. She had
faced harassment, intimidation and imprisonment while covering
terrorist attacks, hostage situations, corruption and abuse of power by
the military and police in Chechnya and the Caucasus region.
Fatima Tlisova. [From video.] I see my job as a mission. The
Russian security attack physically. One of the instances, at 2 a.m. I
woke up. I was swelling. I was bigger than my father. And I thought,
it's probably poison. I was afraid to go to the local hospital. I woke
up my kids and asked the taxi driver to take me to my parent's village.
My mom was a doctor. And I knew that if I got to her alive I'm going to
survive. So as you see, I'm alive.
Ms. Bennett. So why am I showing you a 10-year-old experience?
Because it's happening again. As Jordan mentioned, Fatima's story
sounds eerily familiar to the story of Russian journalist Yulia
Latynina, who recently wrote in The Moscow Times that she was forced to
flee Russia because the Kremlin is losing control over the violence. In
July, a strange gas was released into her home. The police watched her.
Her car was set on fire. And this came a year after an unknown
assailant threw feces on her, another common tactic against independent
journalists. We are also seeing the Russian Government tighten access
to reliable information and crack down on internet freedoms. In August,
Putin banned online messaging, as well as the VPNs commonly used to
circumvent censorship.
It is in this environment that we--the Voice of America--operate.
Our mandate from Congress is to bring America's story to the world, to
explain U.S. policies, and to foster responsible discussion with
accurate, objective, and comprehensive journalism. Like RFE, we are 100
percent funded by Congress and 100 percent independent. Along with RFE/
RL and the three other networks, we comprise international media under
the Broadcasting Board of Governors. Ours is a mission to promote
freedom and democracy. VOA is the largest network for BBG, and it
broadcasts in 47 languages around the world, reaching an estimated 234
million people on a weekly basis. In Russia and the post-Soviet space,
we broadcast in 11 languages, including Russian and English. This past
year, we had the biggest audience increase in our history in radio, TV,
web, digital media.
So VOA's Russian Service has been in operation since 1947.
Ms. Warlick. Excuse me, Amanda. Apologies for interrupting. I'd
like to take a moment to welcome Representative Schiff to the briefing
and give him the floor to make some remarks.
Mr. Schiff. Thank you very much. Appreciate the opportunity to join
you today. And I want to say thank you to the Helsinki Commission for
partnering with the Press Freedom Caucus to host this important event
on threats to press freedom in Russia and post-Soviet states. I'll be
very brief, so that we can get back to hearing from our distinguished
panel. But I'd just like to say a few words on why I think this topic
is so timely and important.
Every day journalists risk their lives to bring news and
information to people around the world. They're often the first to
report at the frontlines of conflict zones, the first to uncover
corruption, and the first to suffer the backlash when powerful forces
would rather keep something hidden. They often take great risk to do
their jobs, facing imprisonment, intimidation, or worse from regimes
and other powerful forces that do not want their stories told.
When I founded the International Press Freedom Caucus, along with
my colleague Mike Pence, in 2006, one of our first actions was writing
to Vladimir Putin in response to the murder of Anna Politkovskaya, the
Russian journalist who reported on the war in Chechnya at great
personal risk, and who was ultimately murdered in her apartment
building. At the time, we noted that she was only the latest Russian
journalist to meet a violent end, and to ask that the Russian
Government investigate her murder and punish those responsible.
It will come as no surprise to any of you that few observers
believe her case was truly investigated and those who ordered or
acceded her assassination were held to account. And as only one of six
journalists working for the independent Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta
murdered in recent years. This is the same newspaper which earlier this
year broke the story of Chechnya's anti-gay campaign, in which gay men
were detained and tortured to death. As our panelists have described,
the environment for free media in Russia has only degraded since Mr.
Pence and I formed this caucus.
Television consists largely of state-run propaganda outlets, while
independent media and investigative reporting is systematically
suppressed. For instance, when RBC Media Group published articles based
on the Panama Papers leaks, which detailed aspects of the finances of
powerful figures close to Putin, top editors were dismissed and
replaced by individuals from state-run outlets. This is the norm in
Putin's Russia, and, regrettably, the same approach to press freedom is
common in many other post-Soviet states.
I have repeatedly highlighted the case of Saparmamed Nepeskuliev, a
journalist in Turkmenistan, who remains imprisoned because of his
courage reporting from that country, one of the worst in the world for
press freedom. I'm proud that the Press Freedom Caucus continues its
bipartisan work with Congressman Steve Chabot of Ohio serving with me
as co-chair. Unfortunately, there remain far too many nations in which
press freedom and the safety and well-being of journalists is under
daily threat. Too many journalists are jailed for reporting the truth
or telling stories that the powerful or violent would rather keep in
the shadows.
And I want to thank, again, you all for being here, and the
wonderful panel that's been assembled to share their important work and
research. And I thank you. [Applause.]
Ms. Warlick. Thank you, Representative Schiff for your remarks, and
for your work in reviving the House Freedom of the Press Caucus.
Amanda, please go ahead and continue.
Ms. Bennett. Thank you, Congressman Schiff.
VOA's Russian Service has been in operation since 1947. So threats
and intimidation are nothing new for us. But in recent years we have
seen increased harassment by Russian authorities, unexplained
bureaucratic delays, and increasingly negative public rhetoric about
VOA's journalism. For example, in January, Foreign Minister Sergey
Lavrov publicly berated a VOA stringer in Moscow, accusing him of lying
about Russia's reaction to a U.S. intelligence report. Watch Mr. Lavrov
here accuse our VOA stringer of promoting lies and junk.
[A video clip in Russian is shown.]
Ms. Bennett. In this clip, which went out nationally, he accused
our stringer of lying. The problem was, Mr. Lavrov was wrong. He was
reading the wrong story. And the error was so egregious that later the
foreign ministry spokeswoman posted on the stringer's Facebook page an
acknowledgement that they had misrepresented the facts. And it's the
first sort-of apology that any of us can remember.
There's also financial intimidation. In August this year, two VOA
stringers in Azerbaijan were summoned to the tax ministry, and both
were interrogated for about two hours. One of the journalists told VOA
that she felt threatened by the tone of two investigators when the
interrogation veered off into questions about her ties to VOA, her
salary, and her bank account. Her legal representative was not allowed
into the meeting, and she said she was afraid for herself and her
family, and asked VOA not to leave her alone against the Azeri
authorities. If history is any guide, once officials start making
public accusations against journalists, then threats and intimidation
and sometimes physical violence follow.
Public pressure is also placed on the stations that carry our
content. Take a look at this investigative story that ran on Russia's
Channel One that pieces together public information--including the BBG
annual report and an inspector general report--to come to the
conclusion that VOA had made secret payments to one of our affiliate
stations.
[A video clip in Russian is shown.]
Ms. Bennett. The truth is, the station couldn't find a record of
payments because there was none. We make our content freely available
around the world, yet pressure like this caused this station to drop
VOA.
This type of intimidation and pressure isn't limited to Russia and
the Russian periphery. I've just returned from a trip from the Balkans,
where I heard local journalists speak of their widespread fear about
pressure from media or business interests aligned with the Kremlin.
Russian capital has undoubtedly penetrated Serbia's media market. In
addition to Russian international media such as Sputnik, Russian money
is funding so-called patriotic orthodox Christian religious web portals
and other information sites. Russian money is apparently in the TV
market as well, with TV Nova, a national cable network, rumored to have
connections with Konstantin Malofeev, a supporter of Putin.
Although the Russian Government may deny directing harassment and
intimidation of journalists, it is complicit. Independent Russian
journalists say the government is, in effect, winking at the
instigators and empowering local actors. Increasing pressure by
governments, whether overt or subtle, is closing the space for
independent journalism, honest dialogue, and the free flow of
information. VOA journalists are incredibly committed to what they do,
which is to tell America's story and explain U.S. policy. But we're
always mindful of our obligation for their safety. Anytime a journalist
is attacked, threatened, or abused it has a dampening effect on the
freedom of the press.
Voice of America provides a much-needed alternative fact-based
narrative in areas such as the Russian periphery where these networks
are trying to gain influence, as well as in Africa, the Middle East,
South Asia, and Latin America. But it is a mistake to think that if we
are shut down that the result is only silence. There are others waiting
behind us to fill the gap. News directors from VOA partners with some
of the biggest independent television stations across Latin America,
including in Venezuela, Colombia, Mexico and Peru, pleaded with VOA not
to abandon them. They told us that if we left, RT--as well as the
Iranian state broadcaster and China's global television, which are all
funded anywhere from twice to many times the VOA's $234 million annual
budget--would move in immediately and pay good money to take our place.
Our presence can protect other journalists, fostering independent
voices. And this is a critical byproduct of our activities.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak today.
Ms. Warlick. And thank you, Amanda, for your presentation. VOA does
such great work and we hope that they're able to operate without
challenge in the region.
Nina.
Ms. Ognianova. Thank you, Jordan. And thank you to the Commission
on Security and Cooperation in Europe and the House Freedom of the
Press Caucus, and Co-Chairs of the Caucus, Representative Adam Schiff
and Representative Steve Chabot for holding this briefing and bringing
the attention to attacks on the press in Russia and other countries of
the former Soviet bloc. I ask that my full written testimony here be
admitted into the record.
My name is Nina Ognianova. And I'm the Europe and Central Asia
program coordinator at the Committee to Protect Journalists [CPJ]. We
are an independent, nonprofit organization dedicated to defending press
freedom and the rights of journalists worldwide. It's an honor to speak
to you today, and I appreciate the opportunity to address the
Commission and the caucus on behalf of CPJ.
In this talk, I will first address Russia's press freedom record,
focusing on some of the recent attacks we have documented on
journalists and press outlets. All of these attacks have gone
unpunished. And I will then talk about attacks on the press in Ukraine,
where impunity in the murder of prominent journalist Pavel Sheremet has
chilled media coverage. Finally, I will mention the records of
Azerbaijan and of Kyrgyzstan, which are two of the countries where
press freedom has continued to worsen this year. And in all of these
cases, I will reference CPJ's own research over the past nine months
using specific cases to illustrate regional threats.
As we heard here, the freedom of the media in the region is
receding, but it's not just receding in this region. Deteriorating
freedom of the press in established European democracy and in the
United States as well has emboldened authoritarian governments in
Russia and other countries of the former Soviet Union to crack down
even further on independent media and opposition voices by using a
variety of methods to silence their critics. In Russia there is an
entrenched culture of impunity, and journalists are regularly
intimidated, attacked, or killed for their work, and their assailants
go unpunished. In Azerbaijan, which is one of the most censored
countries of the world, an autocratic government has continued to go
after the press with retaliatory charges and, disturbingly, has started
to expand its censorship efforts abroad.
In Kyrgyzstan, a country where once there was liberty for press
freedom--or, a degree of liberty for press freedom of the countries of
Central Asia--the president has now lashed out against individual
journalists and has brought insult and defamation charges against the
press in the lead up to this year's elections. And even in Ukraine, a
country where the events of Euromaidan brought new hopes for
improvement in press freedom, CPJ has documented a concerning tendency
to equate positive media coverage with patriotism and critical coverage
with subversion.
In Russia, according to our most recent impunity index--which is a
list published each year which calculates the number of unsolved
journalists' murders as a percentage of the country's population--
Russia ranks 10th worldwide. Nine journalists have been killed in the
past decade. And the perpetrators have gone free. This number
represents only deliberate work-related murders. Cases where
journalists have been killed on dangerous assignments or in combat were
not included in this index.
This impunity sends a signal to adversaries of the press in Russia
that they can continue to censor journalists by intimidating,
attacking, or killing them for reporting or for publishing opinions.
CPJ has documented at least 13 separate cases over the past nine months
in which journalists have been threatened, physically attacked, or
killed in retaliation for their work. We already heard the story of
journalist and commentator Yulia Latynina, who writes a column for
Novaya Gazeta and hosts a weekly radio show on Ekho Moskvy, and how she
was compelled to flee Russia after a series of attacks against her and
her family.
But this is in no way the only case that we have registered. Last
month--actually, in September--Latynina spoke very eloquently in a
Moscow Times opinion editorial, where she said it's not that Putin or
the Kremlin are directly instigating these kinds of attacks. They are
winking at those who want to organize them. They are empowering local
talent. And those people are given a free pass to retaliate. Similarly
to Yulia Latynina, Elena Milashina, who is one of our former
correspondents--in fact, a Moscow correspondent for CPJ--temporarily
left Russia after receiving death threats related to a story she broke
about the detention, torture, and killing of gay men in Chechnya. Two
days after Novaya Gazeta published Milashina's story, Shahidov, an
advisor to Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, called the paper an enemy
of our faith and the motherland, and promised to exact vengeance,
during a gathering of thousands of Chechen men at a large mosque in the
regional capital.
After this, Novaya Gazeta issued a statement saying it feared for
the safety of its journalists, and that Shahidov's remarks would
encourage religious fanatics to retaliate against our journalists. On
April 19, sure enough, the paper received an envelope containing an
unidentified white powder. The only return address was stated simply as
``Grozny''--Chechnya's capital. Police officers and a team from
Russia's emergency situation ministry investigated the incident, but
the powder has yet to be identified. Chechen lawmakers and religious
officials have also threatened journalists from other outlets, who have
reported critically on the North Caucasus republic. And these local
public figures have faced no real consequences from Moscow.
For instance, in January the speaker of Chechnya's parliament
threatened Grigory Shvedov, an editor of the independent news website
Kavkazsky Uzel, one of the handful of publications in Russia that
independently covers the North Caucasus, including Chechnya. The
speaker posted a photograph of a dog with its tongue tied in a knot to
the social media website Instagram, and used crude language to compare
Shvedov to a dog in need of discipline. I'm quoting, ``It is past time
to call a veterinarian,'' the post said, ``to pull out Shvedov's wisdom
teeth and to cut his tongue to size. Then, behold, he might even tell
us something good and informative.'' Shvedov filed a claim against the
official with Russia Investigative Committee, but to this day it
remains unclear whether the Russian authorities even have investigated
the threat.
Separately, CPJ has documented two new journalism-related murders
in Russia this year. Nikolai Andrushchenko, a veteran journalist who
reported on corruption and police brutality, died on April 19th of
injuries sustained when unknown assailants severely beat him. He was
known for his investigative journalism that covered alleged human
rights abuses and corruption. And he suffered previous physical
attacks, including one in November the previous year, when several
assailants attacked him at his doorstep.
In a separate case, Dmitry Popkov, who as a chief editor of the
independent local newspaper Ton-M in Siberia, was murdered on May 24th.
The journalist's body was found with five bullet wounds in his backyard
in the city of Minusinsk. He was known for his investigative journalism
alleging abuse of power and corruption, as well as his criticism of
officials of the ruling United Russian party. Authorities launched an
investigation into the killing in May, but have yet to report any
progress.
In a separate case, authorities continue to hold ethnic Uzbek
journalist Khudoberdi Nurmatov, who is a contributor to Novaya Gazeta,
better known by his pen name Ali Feruz. Nurmatov faces deportation to
Uzbekistan, which he fled in 2008 after local security services tried
to recruit him as an informant. If he returns to Uzbekistan, he is at
risk of imprisonment and torture. Since 2016, Nurmatov has reported on
sensitive subjects such as the plight of Central Asian migrant workers
in Russia, and the December 2016 presidential election in Uzbekistan
for Novaya Gazeta.
After Nurmatov's arrest on immigration charges in Moscow on August
1st, Novaya Gazeta reported that bailiffs beat, insulted, and shocked
him while bringing him to a detention center for foreign nationals in a
Moscow suburb. Novaya Gazeta's Editor-in-Chief Dmitry Muratov, who
visited Nurmatov in the detention center several days after this
incident, reported that the journalist had bruises on his back, was
unable to eat for several days, and suffered from hypertension. CPJ,
along with other rights defense organizations, has called on Russian
authorities to release Nurmatov and to grant him legal residency status
in the country. And separately, there is a case before the European
Court of Human Rights to have Nurmatov released and, again, to gain him
legal residency in Russia. But he's still in detention.
Now I'm going to talk about Ukraine, which, of course, has grabbed
many headlines because of the conflict between Ukrainian forces and
Russian-backed separatists in Ukraine's east. However, I would like to
draw attention to the deteriorating press freedom situation in Ukraine.
The high-profile murder of prominent Belarus-born journalist and
CPJ International Press Freedom Award recipient Pavel Sheremet in
downtown Kiev last year brought into sharp relief a number of press
freedom issues, including the concerning tendency, which is encouraged
by the government, to label journalists and media organizations as
unpatriotic when they report critically on the government. CPJ covered
this and other press freedom issues in our recent report, ``Justice
Denied: Ukraine comes up empty in probe of Pavel Sheremet's murder,''
which found that Sheremet's murder had taken place amid a divisive time
in Ukraine.
The year he was killed, CPJ documented an uptick in attacks and
hostility against journalists who covered the government critically or
who questioned its handling of the conflict in the east. Nationalist
groups verbally assaulted or threatened journalists reporting from the
conflict region. In some instances, government and security officials,
including Interior Minister Arsen Avakov, not only stood by, but
cheered on the attackers. When a CPJ delegation visited Kiev this past
July, we met with all three branches of law enforcement responsible for
solving Sheremet's murder--the General Prosecutor's Office, the
National Police, and the country's Security Service, the SBU. We also
met with President Poroshenko.
Despite stated assurances that Ukraine is committed to solving this
terrible murder as a matter of honor, authorities have reported no
progress, no arrests, no prosecutions, and no leading motive for the
killing. Sheremet's colleagues at the independent news website
Ukrainska Pravda told us that the continued impunity in his murder has
made them more cautious in their reporting. ``I fear for the safety of
my colleagues ever since Sheremet's death,'' Ukrainska Pravda editor-
in-chief Sevgil Musayeva told CPJ. ``After this murder, you want to be
more careful. And I don't know how long this feeling will last.''
Separately, Ukrainian authorities have cracked down on journalists
and media outlets who, they have said, threaten Ukraine's national
interests. In a September 18th public letter to President Poroshenko,
CPJ expressed our deep concern at the SBU's recent actions that have
infringed on press freedom in the country. CPJ has documented at least
seven separate incidents over the previous two months in which the
security forces targeted newsrooms and journalists based on accusations
that appeared politically motivated, and in retaliation for their
critical reporting.
In our letter, we mentioned the SBU's September 14th visit to
Ukrainska Pravda during which a representative of the SBU delivered a
letter demanding the outlet take down an article critical of the
Ukrainian defense capabilities. We also detailed three separate cases
from August in which SBU agents expelled international journalists, and
barred them from Ukraine for three years. And in another case, also
flagged in the letter, the SBU has detained since August 1st a
freelance journalist who reported critically on Ukrainian politics, and
now faces 15 years in prison on anti-state charges.
We also detailed the July 14th raid of the Kiev offices of Media
Holding Vesti, which includes a radio station, a news website, and a
newspaper. A military prosecutor along with 80 masked and armed
security officers searched the Vesti offices, allegedly seeking
evidence in a fraud investigation. We called on President Poroshenko to
denounce the SBU's recent actions, and to reaffirm his commitment to
ensuring journalists' safety, to demonstrate his commitment to
defending democratic institutions. And he has yet to do so.
In Azerbaijan, which is a well-known autocratic country, President
Ilham Aliyev has enjoyed wide-ranging powers that he inherited,
practically, when he got the post from his father in 2003. During his
time in office, Aliyev has cracked down on independent and pro-
opposition outlets, non-governmental institutions and opposition
activists. His harsh measures have pushed many into exile, while
authorities have imprisoned some of Aliyev's most vocal critics. This
year alone, Azerbaijan imprisoned six journalists in addition to the
five it was already holding since the year before. Disturbingly,
Azerbaijan is now extending its justice code abroad.
Belarussian authorities in February 2016 extradited Russian-Israeli
blogger Aleksandr Lapshin to Azerbaijan for trial at the request of
Baku. Azeri authorities then charged the journalist of traveling to,
and reporting from, the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region, and for
criticizing Azeri Government policies. In July of this year, an Azeri
court convicted Lapshin to three years in jail for illegally crossing
the state border. And though he was eventually pardoned and released
following an international outcry, this is one of several cases in
which Azeri authorities have attempted to quiet their critics abroad.
In the most recent case, a French court held a hearing on September
5th in a criminal defamation lawsuit against two French broadcast
journalists over an investigative report they did two years ago. The
report, which aired on a major French broadcaster, referred to
Azerbaijan as a dictatorship. In response, Azerbaijan filed charges
against the report's authors, Elise Lucet and Laurent Richard. And,
disconcertingly, the French justice ministry has complied, and has gone
ahead with the prosecution. The next hearing in the case is scheduled
for November 7th in France.
Most disturbing is the case of Afgan Mukhtarli, who is a freelance
journalist who contributed to the Berlin-based independent news outlet,
Meydan TV, and the London-based Institute of War and Peace Reporting.
Mukhtarli fled to Georgia from Azerbaijan in 2014 after he received
threats over his investigative reporting on corruption in Azerbaijan's
Defense Ministry. On May 29th of this year, Mukhtarli's wife reported
him missing. The journalist's lawyer in Baku told CPJ that Mukhtarli
had been abducted from Tbilisi and forcefully brought back to
Azerbaijan.
Before he disappeared, he had been investigating the assets of
Azerbaijan's first family in Georgia. And Azeri authorities, after he
somehow ended up across the border, charged Mukhtarli with illegally
crossing the border and bringing in contraband, according to his
lawyer, who said Mukhtarli told him the police had planted =10,000 in
his pocket while he was knocked unconscious. Georgia's Interior
Ministry said in May that it was investigating the incident, but has
yet to make any public announcement as to any progress in the case.
In Kyrgyzstan, on October 15th, voters will go to the polls to
elect their next president. But the incumbent, Almazbek Atambayev, has
created a legacy of restriction and intolerance for criticism from the
press. This March alone, on at least three separate occasions,
President Atambayev singled out several independent journalists for
public rebuke, accused the media of pouring dirt on him, and accused
the Kyrgyz Service of the U.S. broadcaster RFE/RL of spreading gossip
about him in order to keep its U.S. Government funders happy.
These public statements by Kyrgyzstan's top leader were followed by
legal actions against some of the journalists and outlets Atambayev
chastised. For instance, hours following the president's March 6
speech, during which he criticized RFE/RL, the prosecutor general's
office charged the broadcaster's Kyrgyz Service, known locally as
Azattyk, with insulting the president. On March 13th, prosecutors filed
another lawsuit against Azattyk and a separate lawsuit against Naryn
Idinov, a co-founder of the independent online news agency Zanoza, whom
Atambayev had attacked in a different public speech. Idinov and his
outlet, Zanoza, were also sued for insulting the president.
Despite a years-long campaign by international media rights groups,
including CPJ, to release an ethnic Uzbek journalist from Kyrgyzstan,
who was sentenced to life in prison in September of 2010 on charges
widely recognized as politically motivated, Kyrgyzstan has continued to
defy its international commitments and has continued to hold the
journalist in prison. On April 21st, 2016, in a milestone decision, the
U.N. Human Rights Committee called on Kyrgyzstan to immediately release
the journalist, Azimjon Askarov, and quash his conviction after they
reviewed a complaint filed by Askarov's lawyers and team of experts
from the New York-based Open Society Justice Initiative. Under its
international obligations, Kyrgyzstan is obligated to respect the
U.N.'s findings. And yet, on 24th of January this year, a Bishkek court
upheld the life sentence against Askarov, and he continues to languish
in jail.
The international community, including leaders in the United
States, cannot afford to be indifferent to attacks on the press in
Russia and the former Soviet bloc. The already embattled press corps in
these countries continue to look up to Washington for solidarity and
support. The United States must not abandon them, and must not forgo
its role as a moral authority and bastion of freedom of the press. When
independent journalists are threatened, attacked, and silenced in the
ways that we have all talked about here today, the rest of the world is
left underinformed about sensitive issues of international interest
such as corruption, human rights abuses, and ongoing conflicts.
CPJ urges the U.S. Helsinki Commission and the House Freedom of the
Press Caucus to make press freedom a priority, and to take a firm stand
against censorship as it is displayed in Russia, Azerbaijan,
Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine, and elsewhere in the former Soviet bloc.
Thank you for providing CPJ with the opportunity to address this
pressing matter.
Ms. Warlick. And thank you very much, Nina, for that great summary
of the situations in Russia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Kyrgyzstan.
Karina.
Ms. Orlova. Good afternoon. My name is Karina Orlova, and I'm a
correspondent for Radio Echo of Moscow. I've been in the United States
since April of 2015. That is when I had to flee Russia because of
persecution of state-backed Chechen radicals, which you've heard about.
It all started right after the terror attack at the Charlie Hebdo
Magazine office in Paris in January of 2015, after the magazine had
published caricatures of Mohammad. The attack led to a million-people
march in Paris of those who support freedom of press and condemn
terrorism. In Russia, though, the only million-people march took place
in Chechnya's capital, Grozny. And those people condemned the murdered
journalists and caricatures of Mohammad. On Echo, all the radio hosts--
and I was one of them--wore T-shirts with the Charlie Hebdo logo the
day after the attack in support for the murdered journalists and the
magazine.
Ramzan Kadyrov, the Chechnya dictator who is now well known for
persecuting and torturing gay people in Chechnya, took a stance too. On
his Instagram account, where he is very active, Kadyrov threatened a
former Russian oil tycoon and prisoner Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who at
that time lived in Switzerland, after Khodorkovsky called for
reprinting caricatures in support of freedom of press. My guest speaker
at the talk show I hosted was a member of the presidential council for
human rights. And of course, I made him speak about Kadyrov's public
threats. And I insisted questioning the speaker on whether he should
have immediately delivered the issue to the council and whether Kadyrov
should have been stopped by law enforcement.
Of course, no one stopped Ramzan Kadyrov, and two days later he
publicly threatened all the journalists at Echo and personally its
chief editor Alexey Venediktov. Right after the show, I started
receiving death threats from people who called me the enemy of Islam
and Kadyrov and who identified themselves as Chechens. They were not
hiding their personalities. I received those threats continuously. And
after Boris Nemtsov had been murdered in the center of Moscow in
February of 2015, and I was still receiving threats, I made a decision
to leave the country. I realized that if they could murder Boris
Nemtsov, such a big, prominent public figure, then no one and nothing
could protect me.
Ramzan Kadyrov is a real danger to people. But as shocking as it
may sound, in Russia we all kind of got used to it. There is nothing
that can be done about Kadyrov, because he is Putin's guarantee of
peace in Chechnya. And Putin would pay for this peace with lives of
others, like human rights activist Natalya Estemirova and journalist
Anna Politkovskaya, both murdered by Kadyrov's people. And yet, I'm not
talking about ordinary Chechens who suffer from Kadyrov on a daily
basis. Citizens of other regions of Russia are now suffering from
Kadyrov too.
But a much worse thing here I discovered was that the federal
police are not in charge when it comes to Kadyrov or his people. I
filed a report on the threat to Moscow police and they didn't do
anything about it, literally. For a week they weren't even opening a
case. And only after Echo's chief editor made a call to Russia's
interior minister office the police did open the criminal case. But
this was a total--[inaudible]. The investigator who questioned me told
me openly that my problem could have been easily solved if I had
stopped doing my job, and that my job was the problem that caused the
threats. To cut a long story short, the police never did anything and
closed the case without investigating it four months later.
So independent journalists in Russia are seen as the enemy of the
state and the government. And law enforcement does not protect them at
all. In small Russian cities and towns, the situation is even worse
because when a journalist from a well known media outlet is persecuted,
it draws attention of other big media outlets. But when it happens in a
small city, journalists are often left one-on-one with local
bureaucracy and authorities. And I'd say that governors are the worst
threat--the biggest threat to journalists in Russian regions, physical
threat.
The most well-known example is the town of Pskov governor who
ordered an assault on Oleg Kashin, a prominent Russian journalist.
Kashin was severely beaten with a metal reinforcement and survived by a
miracle, literally. The actors of the assault, they were caught and
they testified against the governor of town, Andrei Turchak, but he was
never charged with anything, and he still is a governor. Or, another
famous story, when the investigative committee head, Alexander
Bastrykin, took a Novaya Gazeta journalist to the woods and threatened
him there. Bastrykin is still in the office. He's fine.
Among other means of containing journalists in Russia is, of
course, censorship. For instance, it's a really simple example: Calling
annexation of Crimea an annexation will lead to either criminal charges
for calling for separatism, or a warning from the federal media
watchdog. Two warnings within a year lead to media license suspension.
So I'd say it is 100 percent safe to call things what they are only
being out of Russian jurisdiction.
I have no idea what to do about physical threat to journalists. But
as to censorship, well, one can suspend license from media outlets, but
it cannot be done with social media. Social media is a weapon Russians
used against democracy in the U.S. in 2016. But this same weapon, I
think, may and should be successfully used against Putin's regime.
Also, I would--unfortunately Congressman Schiff has left us, but I
would call for American intelligence services or--I don't know--
authorities to leak as much as possible on Putin, because for sure they
know they have information on Putin's money and Putin and his cronies'
money. And it should be out there. It should be leaked to the press, so
that we have more cases like the Panama Papers story. It was good.
If we want to protect journalists from physical assault, we should
destroy Putin's regime.
Thank you.
Ms. Warlick. Well, thank you, Karina, for sharing your personal
story and experiences with us here today. And thank you to all of you
for your remarks.
Before opening up to audience Q&A, I'd like to ask a few questions
of my own.
The subjects that journalists are typically targeted for reporting
on include corruption, human-rights abuses, criticism of authoritarian
regimes and other sensitive subjects. It's also incredibly important
that journalists continue to bring attention to these issues.
Are you concerned that if risks become more severe in the region
that journalists will self censor rather than risk political backlash?
And how do we negate that?
Tom or Amanda, maybe you could speak to this first since
journalists at RFE and VOA really tackle these tough subjects.
Ms. Bennett. Well, you know, I certainly hope we don't have that
issue at RFE or VOA. But certainly, when I came through the Balkans,
the journalists were openly complaining about the need to self-censor,
because the owners of their papers were putting pressure on them as
well. So this was an open topic of conversation that they wished they
could do something different. And in some ways they saw us as a
protection for times when they were able to do things.
Ms. Warlick. Anything to add to that, Tom?
Mr. Kent. Self censorship is always a problem. But with the kind of
regimes we sometimes deal with, anything you report can be considered
outrageous. So you don't have to hold back very much. You almost always
will manage to get some kind of material out that will show some
dimension of the regime which is not widely known and will bring you
some blowback, for sure.
Ms. Warlick. Nina or Karina, do you have anything to add?
Ms. Ognianova. It's not that I fear that journalists will risk self
censorship. They already are doing it. In many of the countries that we
cover, we have seen that independent pro-opposition outlets have either
had to leave the countries where they've operated and have been forced
into exile--which, of course, creates all kinds of difficulty, to have
a network of journalists and correspondents in the countries that they
cover. And those individual journalists left on the ground are left
even more vulnerable without the protection of a newsroom and an
organization behind them. So, of course, they have to think about which
topics they go into and which they don't. And they do so at incredible
peril.
I mean, just look at Khadija Ismayilova in Azerbaijan, who really
is one of the bravest reporters out there, who has tackled corruption
like very few others and has made it her personal mission to continue
to fight this regime. She has taken this as her mission in life to
continue doing this job. But journalists have to be faced with this
dilemma in many countries of the former Soviet bloc--they are faced
with this dilemma. And they have two choices--either to remain and make
some compromises with their coverage and tone down, or to leave their
countries in order to get into safety and to get their families into
safety. It's really an impossible choice.
Ms. Orlova. Well, yes, I agree with Nina. Journalists are doing it,
are applying self censorship. I've never done this, so maybe that is
why I'm here now. But in defense to my colleagues--they avoid saying
annexation. It's so simple, but they really do avoid it. And they
prefer saying--in Russia they call it ``joining Crimea'' or ``returning
Crimea.'' And they always say, like, ``ha, ha, ha, joining Crimea, ha,
ha, ha.''
Well, this ha, ha, ha means, like, we all know it was illegal. It
was annexation. But we will pretend. Again, I think that they also
protect the media outlets they work for, because no one wants to be
shut down.
Ms. Warlick. Yes. Thank you all.
In terms of who is responsible for many of these attacks on
journalists, Karina, you spoke a little bit about that. But we've seen
cases where there are pretty direct ties to even the highest echelons
of the government. In Russia and other countries that we're discussing
today, how much of the threat comes from the top versus on more of a
local level? And to expand on that, how do we know when these attacks
are instigated by criminal organizations or terrorists or
ultranationalists versus orchestrated from government officials?
Maybe, Nina, you could kick us off due to your experience
monitoring so many of these cases so closely at CPJ.
Ms. Ognianova. Well, it's very difficult to determine who's
responsible when there is no or there is little independent thorough
investigation into those cases. One can suspect who the actors are and
who the responsible commissioners are. But some of this killing and
some of these attacks are very professionally done. Unless there is a
concerted effort from local law enforcement with positive pressure of
the international community to do those investigations and do them
right, there is really no way of saying who's responsible. We can
speculate, but we cannot say.
In most of the high-profile murders, of course, there is an element
of suspicion that a crime has been either commissioned or approved by
the high ups. But, again, we're not prosecutors. We're not
investigators. We cannot say that for sure. It's for the responsible
authorities to do their job. And it's our responsibility to push those
responsible authorities to do their job and do it well.
In many cases where there is--you know, CPJ has a long record of
tracking these cases. And we have the Impunity Index, where--for
example, Russia has always been one of the leading, most infamous
countries on this list. And in 90 percent of these cases the
perpetrators are not even identified, let alone prosecuted and punished
for their actions.
So it's very difficult to pinpoint. But what we can say for sure is
that these governments, where the attacks on the press happen with
impunity, are responsible for creating the climate and the atmosphere
in which these crimes are being committed. They are responsible for
allowing this atmosphere of impunity, to say the least. And, again, as
Yulia Latynina very eloquently put it, they have either lost control of
the violence or have voluntarily relinquished this control. We don't
know which one. But the truth of the matter is that journalists are
being attacked with disconcerting frequency in Russia and other
countries of the Soviet bloc. And the perpetrators are almost never
brought to justice.
Ms. Warlick. Anyone else like to respond to this?
Mr. Kent. I think that's just the point, that it all depends on the
tone set at the top. In many cases you'll have no idea who really gave
the order for something or whether some local official or policeman
just felt, well, hey, it seems like open season on journalists, so I'm
going to do my part.
It all depends on what tone comes from the leadership. And that's
where I think that governments can be expected to show some respect for
international human rights and also for their own constitutions.
Ms. Warlick. OK. Well, we are running a little bit low on time, so
I would like to open it up to the audience. If you could, please
volunteer and introduce yourself when you pose a question.
Questioner. Albert from Congressman Schiff's office.
I was wondering if you could speak to the impact of new media in
empowering the voices of dissenters--Alexei Navalny, I think he has a
YouTube channel where he posts videos. I don't know if others have
taken that route? It seems to me that censorship is harder on that end.
Ms. Warlick. New media.
Ms. Orlova. I'm not a big expert on new media, but I appreciate
Radio Free Europe job, and especially a program on Current Time called
Unknown Russia. It's a fantastic job; my favorite one.
But I think that Americans should be one step ahead. And new media
is one step ahead, or maybe not even ahead, but, you know, in the line.
With traditional media, it's always one step behind. And censorship--
what can you do about social media? Like, we have a Russian Facebook.
Well, they have Facebook, actual Facebook, and they have Russian
version of Facebook, VKontakte, with 60 million users, I guess on
VKontakte. It's a great place to spread news from American media
outlets.
Mr. Kent. Yes, I think that social media is the key. It's opened up
an entirely new opportunity for people to make comments on their own.
And I think that governments in many cases just don't know how to deal
with it. In China, you hear there are enormous numbers of people who
spend all their time censoring the internet. And whether other
countries can make that kind of commitment, who knows? It's very, very
difficult. It's sort of the magic bullet for people to be able to speak
out about their own countries.
Just ourselves, we're in the post-Soviet space. In August we had 13
million people or 13 million engagements on our Facebook pages, people
who shared something or made a comment. And we're not special. I mean,
many, many popular figures, news organizations and so forth, get that
kind of engagement. So it's something that I think the regimes are
going to have a lot of trouble in controlling.
Ms. Ognianova. Absolutely, social media is the new frontier. It's
the platform that a lot of journalists go to in the contraction of the
space in traditional outlets. And Russians have produced successfully
their social media networks. But, of course, the governments are
following what's happening, and they are also trying to crack down and
to regulate some of these developments.
In Russia, for example, now there is a law that requires bloggers
with 10,000 or more followers to register as media outlets. And that
makes those blogs and those bloggers susceptible to the restrictions of
the media laws in Russia, which already have a set of tools that can
regulate and restrict freedom of expression.
Bloggers--we have been documenting more and more cases where
bloggers have been attacked for their opinion and their journalistic
activity through their personal blogs. If you go on our website,
www.CPJ.org, we have statistics on imprisoned journalists. And a big
percentage of those are online journalists, including bloggers and
social media users, who have crossed into the definition of
journalistic activity. We have a pretty broad definition of who we
consider a journalist, and that includes personal bloggers. And you
will see that the tendency to crack down on those kinds of activities
has gone up in recent years.
Ms. Warlick. OK. All right. Right here.
Questioner. Thank you very much. My name is Alex and I'm from
Azerbaijan. I thank you all for a very compelling presentation,
particularly on Azerbaijan.
When Russia attacked Azerbaijan in the 1990s, our country found
itself in a very interesting situation. There was no second source to
get information about what exactly was going on--until a few
journalists got together and they decided to change that reality, and
they established a news agency, which actually happened to be the first
news agency, independent news agency, in the post-Soviet region.
And now, as we see a different station, the government is going
after international media outlets. They decided to bring their own
independent media also [in their needs ?], and then you have different
reality. You have Russian media being--like Sputnik and others that are
being able to operate in Azerbaijan.
So what does it tell us, from maybe U.S. and also those countries'
national security perspective? What kind of possible outcomes can you
provide us when you have that reality, that Western and independent
media organizations cannot operate but you have Russian media being
operated in those countries?
Ms. Warlick. Does anyone want to tackle that?
Ms. Bennett. I'm afraid that's beyond our capabilities.
Mr. Kent. I don't think we can make political prognostications
about that.
Ms. Warlick. Would you like to rephrase your question at all for
the panel, maybe?
Questioner. Is there any way to make a national security case from
this attack against press freedom, particularly not only local media
and international, independent and Western media organizations in those
countries? On one hand you have Russia media organizations are
greenlighted, and then you don't have any other media outlets. What
does it tell us from a national security perspective?
Ms. Warlick. [Laughs.] Our panel looks stumped. [Laughs.]
Ms. Bennett. I don't think any of us are really national security
experts. I think we could make a national security case for the value
of a free press around the world, but beyond that, I'm not sure----
Ms. Orlova. Yes, I agree.
Ms. Warlick. That's actually one of the questions I was a hoping to
ask was, at the OSCE Human Dimension Implementation Meeting in Warsaw,
we had the opportunity to meet with the Representative on Freedom of
the Media, Harlem Desir. And he mentioned that one of his priorities is
reconciling national security and press freedom. But we know that
journalists are targeted often on the basis of national security
concerns, sometimes even framed as an internal enemy.
Is there a way, or what is the best way, to convince countries,
both government officials and the public, that a free press is in their
national interest?
Ms. Bennett. W I think that we all operate under the assumption,
and the historical assumption that a free press is the basis, one of
the fundamental bases, for a free and democratic society. If you're
hoping to operate a free and democratic society, then you obviously
need a free press to do that. These two things go together in our mind.
Ms. Ognianova. I agree. I think that what we can say is that it is
in the national security of any government to allow an independent
press to operate freely, because those governments too need free and
independent and truthful information. And if all information is
controlled and filtered, then the government itself loses its
connection with reality and what's going on, not only inside the
country but the rest of the world, if the country continues to contract
the free space and therefore isolate itself from the rest of the
international community.
Ms. Warlick. All right, next question.
Questioner. Hi. I'm Jordan from Congressman Josh Gottheimer's
office.
I was wondering if you think that tools of international
diplomacy--for example, economic sanctions--might be an effective way
of pressuring the Putin regime into alleviating restrictions on the
press, or if you think we might have perhaps more success working with
local governments to change the culture from the bottom up.
Thanks.
Ms. Orlova. Oh, yes. Actually, sanctions do work, especially
financial sanctions. Although the Russian Government pretends they do
not, it's not true, because we know, for instance, in 2015 the head of
VTB Bank, Andrey Kostin, was here running around Capitol Hill begging
for financing for his banks, saying, well, I don't have anything to do
with the Kremlin agenda, we're independent. And for the sake of
Ukraine, because we operate in Ukraine, just give us some money--
something like that.
So sanctions do work, financial sanctions. I'm not so sure about
whether--well, I'm against RT and Sputnik, but it's not so simple,
because if RT is prohibited here in the States, then all other media,
like American media outlets, will be prohibited, I guess, in Russia. So
I'm not sure if it's worth it, because, despite the fact that RT has a
huge budget, it's totally corrupted as anything in Russia. So a big
part of this budget goes to Margarita Simonyan--she lives large.
They really don't spend that much, because they're not ideological.
They don't care about--they're not Soviets, you know. At least Soviets
have their agenda, real ideology, as crooked as it was. But they did.
Those guys, no, their only ideology is money. So I'm not sure. But
financial sanctions, yes. Putin--I think that the United States should
keep pressing Kremlin with financial sanctions as much as possible.
Ms. Warlick. This will be the final question, for the sake of time.
MASSARO: I'm Paul Massaro and I'm the anticorruption advisor at the
Helsinki Commission. Really excited to have you all here.
I'm very interested in this nexus between corruption and press
freedom. I was hoping you could make some comments on to what extent
are these attacks largely caused by investigations into corrupt
dealings among politicians and others? And to what extent is press
freedom a necessary or useful aspect to combat corruption in these
countries?
Mr. Kent. I think corruption is always the hot-button issue. In
many of the countries that we deal with, it is possible to write a
story in a newspaper website saying even that the president's foreign
policy is misguided and so forth. This passes as acceptable speech
sometimes. But, boy, you get into certain financial stuff and
mentioning certain people and certain banks and so forth, it's a really
different story. So I think you're right that it opens the way to lots
of problems, the way some other reporting doesn't.
Ms. Bennett. I would completely agree with that. And also,
ironically--maybe not ironically--it's also the subject you find that
their reporters, the journalists themselves, are most drawn to wanting
to do. I think it's partly because it's so present. It's so present.
And it seems so wrong to them that they want to do investigative work
on it.
Ms. Ognianova. Corruption is also probably the most dangerous
assignment for journalists. If you look at the statistics of killed
journalists across most of the Eurasia region, the majority covered
corruption. And most of them were attacked or threatened before the
violence against them escalated, because they did some hard-hitting
piece on corruption.
It is absolutely amazing that those journalists continue to do the
kind of work that they do, because the danger to them is immense. And
every year we document the Global Impunity Index. We come up with the
documentation to show that it is those journalists who, like lone
warriors, go into this environment and tackle this subject. It's mostly
corruption and human rights abuses that have them targeted.
Ms. Warlick. OK. Well, to wrap up, I'd like to give you the
opportunity to say any final words that you'd like, and maybe provide
us with some concrete recommendations for U.S. Government, U.S.
Congress, the OSCE, and whatever final words you'd like to leave us
with.
Ms. Orlova. I would recommend looking as much as possible on Putin
and his money, because there is no way Putin can be friends with the
United States again. And what else? Supporting journalism, like true
journalism and spreading it on social media is a good way to reach out
to Russian people.
Ms. Ognianova. I would like to see more of this kind of briefing.
Again, thank you to the Commission and to the Freedom of the Press
Caucus for convening this, because I think that even though the
advocacy opportunities with some of those governments that we talked
about may be very limited at the moment, it remains very important for
the public, and leadership in the U.S. to be informed about press
freedom issues in the region and to continue its support for the
embattled press corps. They do look to Washington for both moral
support and tangible support. They continue to do that. And Washington
and the U.S. should not forgo that role.
Ms. Bennett. I would like to say that it appears to me that we are
in a moment that is as dangerous and as threatening for a free press
around the world as any we've ever been in our lifetimes, certainly. I
would not underestimate by any measure the impact that U.S.
international media, the BBG, has around the world in a number of
different ways.
There's the material that we put out there that provides an
alternative narrative. There is the fact that not just the immediate
media but all the surrounding media is also corrupt and held down. And
so it provides, like a wire service, to put actual other material out
into the local press. It gives them some alternative thing to put in
there.
We also provide protection for local journalists to do the kind of
work that they want to do by partnering with them, giving them an
outlet. And, in fact, I was amazed to discover the number of media
people who said simply by having us appear on their programs would have
a protective effect for them for a long time.
So we have a huge impact in these regions. And I think that for us
to continue to do our work in as robust a way as possible is certainly
one way of combating this, because I don't think any of us here should
underestimate what's going on in the world.
Mr. Kent. I certainly endorse everything Amanda says. And let me
just add one thing, on sort of an optimistic note, a little more big
picture, and that is that information gets out. The truth gets out.
Reporters go through horrible experiences--sometimes they're attacked,
beaten and so forth; self censorship; huge propaganda operations
arrayed against the truth--yet I don't think we have any doubt about
the nature of the regimes in the world. I don't think ultimately the
citizens of those regimes have any doubt about what goes on in those
countries.
The truth is very, very hard to suppress, even more so now with
social networks and the abilities of people to communicate with each
other. This is a terribly difficult job we do. We're under terrible
pressures. We try to defend our people as best we can. But we know that
ultimately information wants to get out. It wants to be free. And it
always ultimately wins.
Ms. Warlick. Thank you very much, and to all of you for your
remarks today and for being here.
Thanks too to the House Freedom of the Press Caucus for working
with the Helsinki Commission on this event.
And thank you all for being here today. [Applause.]
[Whereupon, at 4:40 p.m., the briefing ended.]
A P P E N D I X
Systematic Attacks on Journalists in Russia and Other Post-Soviet
States
Thank you to the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
and the House Freedom of the Press Caucus, and Co-Chairs of the Caucus,
Representative Adam Schiff and Representative Steve Chabot, for holding
this briefing to bring attention to attacks on the press in Russia and
other countries of the former Soviet bloc. I ask that my full written
testimony be admitted into the record. My name is Nina Ognianova and I
am the Europe and Central Asia program coordinator of the Committee to
Protect Journalists. CPJ is an independent, nonprofit organization
dedicated to defending press freedom and the rights of journalists
worldwide. It is an honor to speak to you today and I appreciate the
opportunity to address the Commission and the Caucus on behalf of CPJ.
In my testimony, I will first address Russia's press freedom
record, focusing on recent cases of attacks on journalists and press
freedom outlets, which have largely gone unpunished.
I will then talk about attacks on the press in Ukraine, where
impunity in the murder of prominent journalist Pavel Sheremet has
chilled media coverage.
Finally, I will mention the records of Azerbaijan and Kyrgyzstan,
two countries where press freedom has continued to worsen.
In all these cases I will reference CPJ's research over the past
nine months, using specific cases to illustrate regional threats.
Introduction
Receding media freedom both in established European democracies and
in the United States has emboldened authoritarian governments in Russia
and other countries of the former Soviet Union to crack down on
independent media and opposition voices using a variety of methods to
silence their critics.
In Russia, there is an entrenched culture of impunity: journalists
are regularly intimidated, attacked or killed for their work, and their
assailants go unpunished.
In Azerbaijan, one of the most censored countries in the world, an
autocratic government has continued to go after the press with
retaliatory charges, and, disturbingly, has been expanding its
censorship abroad.
In Kyrgyzstan, a country once considered a leader of press freedom
in Central Asia, the president has lashed out against individual
journalists, and brought insult and defamation charges against the
press in the lead up to this year's election.
Even in Ukraine, a country where the events of Euromaidan brought
new hopes for improvement in press freedom, CPJ has documented a
concerning tendency, supported by the government, to equate positive
media coverage with patriotism and critical coverage with subversion.
Russia
According to CPJ's most recent Impunity Index - a list published
each year by CPJ, which calculates the number of unsolved journalist
murders as a percentage of a country's population - Russia ranks 10th
worldwide. Nine journalists have been killed in the past decade, and
nearly all perpetrators have gone free. This number represents only
deliberate, work-related murders; cases of journalists killed on
dangerous assignments or in combat were not included.
In spite of a few convictions in recent years in a couple of high-
profile murders that date back to the early 2000s, such as the
sentencing and imprisonment of several men for the murder of Novaya
Gazeta journalists Anna Politkovskaya and Igor Domnikov, none of the
crimes' commissioners have been brought to justice.
This impunity sends a signal to adversaries of press freedom in
Russia that they can continue to censor journalists by intimidating,
attacking or killing them for their reporting or published opinions.
CPJ has documented at least 13 separate cases over the past eight
months, in which journalists have been threatened, physically attacked
or killed in retaliation for their work. Last month, the well-known
journalist and commentator Yulia Latynina, who writes a column for the
independent Novaya Gazeta newspaper, and hosts a weekly radio show on
Ekho Moskvy radio, was compelled to flee Russia after a series of
attacks against her and her family.
In the latest incident on September 3, attackers set fire to
Latynina's car parked near the wooden house she shares with her parents
in the Moscow suburbs. This occurred two months after unknown
assailants sprayed a foul-smelling substance through the window of
Latynina's home, causing several of the residents, including two
children, to get sick. Though Russian authorities launched
investigations into both incidents, they have yet to hold those
responsible to account.
Last month during her radio show, Latynina, spoke from an
undisclosed location, and told listeners she did not intend to return
to Russia any time soon.
In a September 22 op-ed for The Moscow Times, Latynina said she
left the country because she felt the Kremlin had renounced control
over those who perpetrate violence against its opponents. ``It's not
that Putin or the Kremlin are directly instigating these kinds of
attacks,'' she said. ``They are winking at those who want to organize
them. They're empowering `local talent,' and those people are given a
free pass.''
Similarly, in April, Novaya Gazeta's prominent investigative
journalist Elena Milashina temporarily left Russia after receiving
death threats related to a story she broke about the detention,
torture, and killing of gay men in Chechnya, a Russian republic.
Two days after Novaya Gazeta published Milashina's story, Adam
Shahidov, an advisor to Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, called the
paper an enemy ``of our faith and motherland,'' and promised to exact
``vengeance'' during a gathering of thousands of Chechen men at a large
mosque in the regional capital.
After this, Novaya Gazeta issued a statement saying it feared for
the safety of its reporters, and that Shahidov's remarks would
``encourage religious fanatics to retaliate against our journalists.''
On April 19, the paper received an envelope containing an
unidentified white powder. The only return address was stated simply as
``Grozny''-Chechnya's capital. Police officers and a team from Russia's
emergency situations ministry investigated the incident, but the powder
has yet to be identified, Novaya Gazeta journalists told CPJ.
Chechen lawmakers and religious officials have also threatened
journalists from other newsrooms who have reported critically on the
North Caucasus republic, and these local public figures have faced no
real consequences from Moscow.
A Chechen lawmaker and religious officials threatened Aleksei
Venediktov, editor of the radio station Ekho Moskovy, after Venediktov
expressed solidarity with Novaya Gazeta's staff in an April 14 blog
post.
The speaker of Chechnya's parliament, Magomed Daudov, threatened
Grigory Shvedov, the editor of the independent news website Kavkazsky
Uzel (Caucasian Knot), one of a handful of publications in Russia that
independently covers the North Caucasus region, including Chechnya.
On January 4, Daudov posted a photograph of a dog with its tongue
tied in a knot to the social media website Instagram, and used crude
language to compare Shvedov to a dog in need of discipline. ``It is
past time to call a veterinarian,'' the post said, ``to pull out
[Shvedov's] wisdom teeth and to cut his tongue to standard size. Then,
behold, he might even tell us something good and informative.''
Shvedov filed a claim against Daudov with Russia's Investigative
Committee, but to this day it remains unclear if Russian authorities
investigated the threat.
Separately, CPJ has documented two new journalism-related murders
in Russia this year.
Nikolai Andrushchenko, a veteran journalist who reported on
corruption and police brutality, died on April 19, of injuries
sustained when unknown assailants severely beat the 73-year-old.
A sharp critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin known for his
investigative reporting that alleged human rights abuses and
corruption, Andrushchenko had suffered previous physical attacks,
including one in November 2016 when several assailants attacked him at
his doorstep.
The journalist's colleagues told CPJ Russian authorities have not
brought any of Andrushchenko's attackers to justice.
In a separate case, Dmitry Popkov, chief editor of the independent
local newspaper Ton-M in Siberia, was murdered on May 24 in Siberia.
The journalist's body was found with five bullet wounds in his backyard
in the city of Minusinsk, in the Siberian region of Krasnoyarsk Krai.
The 42-year-old had helped found Ton-M in 2014, and was known for
his investigative reports alleging abuse of power and corruption, as
well as his criticism of officials of the ruling United Russia party.
In an August 2016 editorial, Popkov wrote that Ton-M was
``accustomed to being a pain in the neck for many officials who are
trying to [silence us] in every possible way,'' through ``phone
threats, intimidating searches, and interrogations.'' He added that the
authorities were concerned about the ``corruption incidents that we
reveal.''
A colleague of Popkov's, Sergei Shishov from the Minusinsk
independent news website Sreda24, said he believed Popkov was killed
for his journalism, particularly for his latest reports about a federal
parliamentary audit that revealed corruption in the local
administration.
Authorities launched an investigation into the killing in May, but
have yet to report progress.
CPJ has documented a case in which Russian security forces
conducted a politically motivated raid on a journalist's home in
Moscow. In the city of Svetogorsk, located near the Finnish border,
security services detained three journalists who were trying to report.
At least two other journalists are currently imprisoned in Russia
for their reporting.
In a separate case, Russian authorities continue to hold ethnic
Uzbek journalist Khudoberdi Nurmatov, a regular contributor to Novaya
Gazeta, better known by his pen name Ali Feruz.
Nurmatov faces deportation to Uzbekistan, a country he fled in 2008
after local security services tried to recruit him as an informant. If
he returns, he is at risk of imprisonment and torture. Since 2016,
Nurmatov has reported on sensitive subjects such as the plight of
Central Asian migrant workers in Russia, and the December 2016
presidential election in Uzbekistan for Novaya Gazeta.
After Nurmatov's arrest on immigration charges in Moscow on August
1, Novaya Gazeta reported that bailiffs beat, insulted, and shocked
Nurmatov while bringing him to a detention center for foreign nationals
in a Moscow suburb. Novaya Gazeta Editor-in-Chief Dmitry Muratov, who
visited Nurmatov in the detention center on August 5, reported that the
journalist had bruises on his back, was unable to eat for three days,
and suffered from hypertension. CPJ, along with other rights defense
organizations, has called on Russian authorities to release Nurmatov,
and grant him legal residency status in the county.
Ukraine
Many headlines have been devoted to the conflict between Ukrainian
forces and Russian-backed separatists in Ukraine's east. However, I
would like to draw your attention to the deteriorating press freedom
situation in Ukraine.
The high-profile murder of prominent Belarus-born journalist and
CPJ International Press Freedom Award recipient Pavel Sheremet in
downtown Kiev last year brought into relief a number of press freedom
problems including the concerning tendency, encouraged by the
government, to label media organizations as unpatriotic when they
report critically on the government.
CPJ covered this and other press freedom issues in our recent
report, ``Justice Denied: Ukraine comes up empty in probe of Pavel
Sheremet's murder,'' which found that the journalist's murder had taken
place amid a divisive time in Ukraine.
The year Sheremet was killed, CPJ documented an uptick in attacks
and hostility against journalists who covered the government critically
or questioned its handling of the conflict in the east. Nationalist
groups verbally assaulted or threatened journalists reporting from the
conflict region. In some instances, government and security officials,
including Interior Minister Arsen Avakov, not only stood by, but
cheered on the attackers.
When a CPJ delegation visited Kiev this past July, we met with
members of all three branches of government responsible for solving
Sheremet's murder: The General Prosecutor's Office, the National
Police, and the country's Security Service (SBU). We also met with
President Petro Poroshenko.
Despite stated assurances that Ukraine is committed to solving
Sheremet's murder as a matter of honor, authorities reported no
progress, no arrests, no prosecutions, and no leading motive for the
killing.
Sheremet's colleagues at the independent news website Ukrainska
Pravda told us that the continued impunity in his murder has made they
more cautious in their reporting. ``I fear for the safety of my
colleagues ever since [Sheremet's death],'' Ukrainska Pravda editor-in-
chief Sevgil Musayeva told CPJ. ``After this murder, you want to be
careful. I don't know how long this feeling will last.''
Separately, Ukrainian authorities have cracked down on journalists
and media outlets who, they have said, threaten Ukraine's national
interests.
In a September 18 public letter to President Poroshenko, CPJ
expressed our deep concern at the SBU's recent actions that have
infringed on press freedom in the country. CPJ documented at least
seven separate incidents over the previous two months in which the SBU
targeted newsrooms, and journalists based on accusations that appeared
politically motivated, and in retaliation for critical reporting.
In our letter, we mentioned the SBU's September 14 visit to
Ukrainska Pravda during which they delivered a letter demanding the
outlet take down an article critical of Ukrainian government policies.
We also detailed three separate cases from August in which SBU agents
expelled international journalists, and barred them from Ukraine for
three years. In another case, also flagged in the letter, the SBU has
detained a freelance journalist since August 1 who reported critically
on Ukrainian politics, and now faces 15 years in prison on anti-state
charges.
In the letter we also mention the SBU's August 8 raid on a pro-
Russia news website. The security service then searched the homes of
two of the site's journalists, and opened an investigation into its
editor for alleged disclosure of state secrets.
Lastly, we detailed the July 14 raid of the Kiev offices of Media
Holding Vesti, which includes a radio station, a news website, and a
newspaper. A military prosecutor and 80 masked and armed security
officers searched the Vesti offices allegedly in search of evidence in
a fraud investigation.
We called on President Poroshenko to denounce the SBU's recent
actions, and to reaffirm his commitment to ensuring journalists' safety
to demonstrate his commitment to defending democratic institutions. He
has yet to do so.
Azerbaijan
In Azerbaijan, the autocratic President Ilham Aliyev has enjoyed
wide-ranging powers since he inherited the post from his father in
2003.
During his time in office, Aliyev has consolidated power, and
cracked down on independent and pro-opposition media outlets, non-
governmental organizations, and opposition activists. His harsh
measures have pushed many into exile, while authorities have imprisoned
some of Aliyev's most vocal critics.
This year alone, Azerbaijan imprisoned six journalists in addition
to the five it was already holding the year before.
Disturbingly, Azerbaijan is now extending its justice code abroad.
Belarussian authorities in February 2016 extradited Russian-Israeli
blogger Aleksandr Lapshin to Azerbaijan for trial at the request of
Baku. Azeri authorities then charged the journalist of traveling to,
and reporting from the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region, and for
criticizing Azeri government policies. In July of this year, an Azeri
court convicted Lapshin to three years in jail for illegally crossing
the state border.
Though he was eventually pardoned and released, following an
international outcry, this is one of several cases in which Azeri
authorities have attempted to quiet their critics abroad.
In the most recent case, a French court held a hearing on September
5 in a criminal defamation lawsuit against two French broadcast
journalists over an investigative report they did two years ago.
The report, which aired on a major French broadcaster, France-2,
referred to Azerbaijan as a ``dictatorship.''
In response, Azerbaijan filed charges against the reports' authors,
Elise Lucet and Laurent Richard. Disconcertingly, the French justice
ministry has complied, and went ahead with the prosecution. The next
hearing in the journalists' case is scheduled for November 7.
Most disturbing is the case of Afgan Mukhtarli, a freelance
journalist who contributed to the Berlin-based, independent news
outlet, Meydan TV, and the London-based Institute of War and Peace
Reporting. Mukhtarli fled to Georgia from Azerbaijan in 2014 after
receiving threats over his investigative reporting on corruption in
Azerbaijan's Defense Ministry.
On May 29 this year, Mukhtarli's wife reported him as missing. The
journalist's lawyer Elchin Sadygov in Baku told CPJ that Mukhtarli had
been abducted from Tbilisi and forcefully brought to Azerbaijan, CPJ
documented at the time.
Before he disappeared, Mukhtarli had been investigating the assets
of Azerbaijan's first family in Georgia, the journalist's colleague
Khadija Ismayilova told CPJ.
Azeri authorities charged Mukhtarli with illegally crossing the
border, and bringing in contraband, according to Sadygov, who said
Mukhtarli told him the police planted ?10,000 ($11,200) in his pocket
while he was unconscious.
Georgia's Interior Ministry said in May that it was investigating
the incident, according to media reports, but has made no further
announcements.
On September 22, Georgia's prosecutor's office offered a personal
guard to Mustafayeva, after she said she was being followed in Tbilisi,
the regional news website Kavkazsky Uzel reported.
Kyrgyzstan
On October 15, Kyrgyzstan's voters go to the polls to elect their
next president. But the incumbent, Almazbek Atambayev, has created a
legacy of restriction and intolerance to criticism from the press.
While Kyrgyzstan was once considered Central Asia's most liberal
country, the Kyrgyz authorities have in recent years cracked down on
independent journalists, including foreign media, and prosecuted
individual reporters and media outlets on retaliatory charges. Despite
a UN decision that ordered his release, Kyrgyz authorities have
continued to hold a prominent journalist and human rights defender in
prison.
This past March alone, on at least three separate occasions,
President Atambayev singled out several independent journalists for
public rebuke, accused the media of ``pouring dirt on him,'' and
accused the Kyrgyz service of the US broadcaster Radio Free Europe/
Radio Liberty of spreading gossip about him in order to ``keep its U.S.
government funders happy.''
These public statements by Kyrgyzstan's top leader were followed by
legal action against some of the journalists and outlets Atambayev
chastised. For instance, hours following the president's March 6
speech, during which he criticized RFE/RL, the prosecutor general's
office charged the broadcaster's Kyrgyz Service, known locally as
Azattyk, with ``insulting the president.'' On March 13, prosecutors
filed another suit against Azattyk and a separate lawsuit against Naryn
Idinov, co-founder of the independent online news agency Zanoza, whom
Atambayev had attacked in a public speech. Idinov and his outlet,
Zanoza, were also sued for insulting the president.
Despite a years-long campaign by international media rights and
human rights defense organizations, including CPJ, to release an ethnic
Uzbek journalist from Kyrgyzstan, who was sentenced to life in prison
in September 2010 on charges widely recognized as politically
motivated, Kyrgyzstan has continued to hold him in prison.
On April 21, 2016, in a milestone decision, the U.N. Human Rights
Committee called on Kyrgyzstan to immediately release the journalist,
Azimjon Askarov, and quash his conviction after they reviewed a
complaint filed in November 2012 by Askarov's lawyer and a team of
experts from the New York-based Open Society Justice Initiative.
Under its international obligations, particularly Article 2 of the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Kyrgyzstan is
obligated to make full reparation to the individual whose rights have
been violated, and must take immediate steps to release the individual,
and overturn the conviction. Kyrgyzstan is also obligated under its
constitution to respect the U.N.'s findings. Yet, instead, on January
24, 2017, the Chui Regional Court in Bishkek upheld the life sentence
against Askarov on patently political charges of complicity in murder
and inciting hatred. Askarov continues to sit in prison.
Conclusion
The international community, including leaders in the United
States, cannot afford to be indifferent to attacks on the press in
Russia and the former Soviet bloc countries. The already embattled
press corps in these states continue to look to Washington for
solidarity and support. The United States must not abandon them, and
must not forgo its role as a moral authority and bastion of freedom of
the press and freedom of expression. When independent journalists are
threatened, attacked, and silenced in the ways I outlined today, the
rest of the world is left under-informed about sensitive issues of
international interest such as corruption, human rights abuses, and
ongoing conflicts.
CPJ urges the U.S. Helsinki Commission and the House Freedom of the
Press Caucus to make press freedom a priority, and take a firm stand
against censorship as it is displayed in Russia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan,
Kyrgyzstan, and other nations of the former Soviet bloc.
Thank you for providing CPJ with the opportunity to address this
pressing matter.
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