23:38, 5 July 2023

Attack on Milashina fits into trend of Chechen authorities' attitude to journalists

Alexander Nemov and Elena Milashina after being attacked. Photo from Sergey Babinets' Telegram channel

The attack on Elena Milashina and the lawyer Alexander Nemov was the latest in a series of attacks on journalists and threats addressed by Chechen authorities to media professionals.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on their way from the airport to Grozny, Elena Milashina, a journalist of the "Novaya Gazeta" outlet, and Alexander Nemov, an advocate for Zarema Musaeva, were attacked.

Ramzan Kadyrov has repeatedly criticized journalists. In particular, he proposed to ban the work of those media in Russia that criticize authorities' actions and write about human rights violations, calling them "information saboteurs"; while the Russian State Duma has already adopted in the first reading a bill on control over foreign agents.

On January 24, 2022, amid the scandal with Zarema Musaeva, who was abducted by Chechen law enforcers from Nizhny Novgorod to Grozny, Kadyrov treated Elena Milashina and the "Dozhd" (Rain) TV Channel* as terrorist accomplices.

On April 21, 2023, nine Russian and international human rights organizations asked the PACE Special Rapporteur on Northern Caucasus to fix the threats of the Chechen leader, Ramzan Kadyrov, against Elena Milashina.

On February 6, 2020, Elena Milashina and Marina Dubrovina, a Krasnodar lawyer, were attacked by a group of men and women in a Grozny hotel.

On March 9, 2016, a minibus was attacked in Ingushetia on its way to Grozny, not far from the Chechen border. Eight journalists and human rights defenders, as well as the minibus driver, were beaten up; four of them were hospitalized.

*Included by the Russian Ministry of Justice (MoJ) into the register of foreign agents.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on July 4, 2023 at 03:06 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.

Source: Caucasian Knot