Moscow
The Russian government tried to block some of the region’s most respected journalists from reporting on the school hostage tragedy in Beslan last week. Two top Georgian reporters were arrested when they reached Beslan; they were held until the shooting had stopped and more than 350 lives were lost. Andrei Babitsky, a reporter with U.S.-funded Radio Liberty, was detained at the Moscow airport, and was released only after U.S. protests. Babitsky had been held by Russian forces once before, after he reported on the Russian onslaught in Chechnya, and was freed after two months of arbitrary detention and beatings. And Raf Shakirov, the respected editor of Moscow’s Izvestiya, was forced to resign after publishing a full-page photo spread of the schoolyard victims. Izvestiya was one of the first papers to dispute the government’s assertion that only 300 hostages were being held by Chechen separatists. The actual number turned out to be more than 1,200.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Home Depots are the new epicenters of ICE raidsIn the Spotlight The chain has not provided many comments on the ongoing raids
-
Why does Trump keep interfering in the NYC mayoral race?Today's Big Question The president has seemingly taken an outsized interest in his hometown elections, but are his efforts to block Zohran Mamdani about political expediency or something deeper?
-
The pros and cons of banning cellphones in classroomsPros and cons The devices could be major distractions
