Russian Reporter critical of Putin and of his protegé Kadyrov, murdered (UPDATED)

From AOL News:

A journalist shot to death in an apparent contract killing was about to publish a story about torture and abductions in Chechnya when she was slain, her editor said Sunday, as Russia’s top prosecutor took charge of the case.

Anna Politkovskaya, famed for her unsparing coverage of abuses against civilians in Chechnya in the outspoken newspaper Novaya Gazeta, was found dead Saturday in the elevator of her Moscow apartment building. She had two gunshot wounds — one to the head.

Politkovskaya, 48, had collected witness accounts and photos of tortured bodies and the article had been due for publication Monday, her newspaper’s editors said.

“We never got the article, but she had evidence about these (abducted) people and there were photographs,” Novaya Gazeta’s deputy editor, Vitaly Yerushensky, told Ekho Moskvy radio.

In a recent radio interview, Politkovskaya said that she was a witness in a criminal case against Moscow-backed Chechen Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov, whose security forces have been accused of kidnapping civilians and other abuses.

“These are cases of kidnappings, including one criminal case concerning an abduction personally involving Ramzan Kadyrov, a kidnapping of two people, whose photographs are now on my desk,” she said in comments rebroadcast Sunday by Ekho Moskvy.

In the interview, which Ekho Mosvky said had been granted to Radio Free Europe, she said that the victims, an ethnic Russian and a Chechen, were “rounded up, kidnapped for a time and killed. Their bodies showed signs of serious torture.”

This was not the first time there was an attempt to kill her:

Politkovskaya had come under threat repeatedly. In 2004, she fell seriously ill with symptoms of food poisoning after drinking tea on a flight from Moscow to southern Russia during the school hostage crisis in Beslan. Her colleagues suspected the incident was an attempt on her life.

Is this another proof of how the Kremlin is treating dissidents? Kadyrov -today is his 30th birthday- is a hard-line Muslim who has the support of the Kremlin. Even if the Kremlin has not directly ordered the murder, his support for this kind of “dear leader” is shocking.

UPDATE: Background here (HT Extreme Centre).

Corriere della Sera points out the silence of the Kremlin about her murder. It also says that the murderer has been filmed: it was a young man with a black jacket [giubbotto??] and a black baseball cap. The Makarov pistol he used to kill her was abandoned in the crime site. The newspaper has announced they will carry an independent investigation of her murder.

More on Reuters and Pravda.

Related:

• Chechenya starts demanding women they should wear headscarves.
• Putin’s heroes.

Una periodista, Politovskaya, que ha denunciado los excesos del Kremlin en la guerra chechena, ha sido asesinada de dos tiros -uno en la cabeza- en su ascensor. La periodista había denunciado a Kadyrov, el protegido extremista musulmán del Kremlin, de secuestrar a 2 personas, uno checheno y otro ruso y matarlos después. Según las fotos que declaró tener en su mesa, “sus cuerpos presentan signos de tortura muy importantes”.  No era la primera vez que había un intento de asesinarla: en 2004, tuvo síntomas graves de haber sido envenenada después de haber bebido un té en un vuelo de Moscú al sur de Rusia cuando los sucesos de Beslán. Más información: El Mundo, La Razón, Libertad Digital, El País. In French: Le Figaro, Le Monde. In Italian: Corriere della Sera.

PHOTO: Politovskaya, during the presentation of her new book: “In Putin’s Russia”.

People remembering Politovskaya in Moscow in the Poutkin Square after knowing of her murder.

 

A boy puts a flower next to a portrait of the killed journalist.

Others blogging about this: Sugiero.