The International Federation of
Journalists (IFJ) today paid tribute to the sacrifice of dozens of murdered
Russian journalists and their families at a special event in Moscow.
The IFJ affiliate the Russian Union of Journalists (RUJ) held its annual
Memorial Day in Moscow
to honour journalists and media personnel who lost their lives as a result of
their work over the last twenty years.
"We honour all of those who have been targeted, brutalised and done
to death in Russia for doing
their job, telling the truth," said
Jim Boumelha, IFJ President in a
message read out at the event. "And we congratulate the union for keeping alive the memories of our colleagues. The loss of these lives is tragic for
all of us and it is
difficult to bear,
particularly
for the families of the
victims."
The RUJ held the annual event
on Tuesday 15 December at the Journalists Club in Moscow, capping another
violent year in which a dozen journalists and media workers lost their lives,
including prominent journalists Anastasia Baburova, Sergei Protazanov, Vyacheslav Yaroshenko, Natalia
Estemirova, Malik Akhmedilov and Olga Kotovskaya.
An estimated 300 journalists and
media workers have died over the last 20 years in Russia, many of them murdered because
of their work, says the RUJ.
The IFJ in collaboration with the
union and
two leading Russian monitors of abuses against journalists, the
Glasnost Defence Foundation and the Centre for Journalism in Extreme Conditions has set up an online database http://journalists-in-russia.org to record the killings of journalists in Russia
and provide information about their deaths.
The database was launched on 15
June along with the IFJ report ‘Partial Justice; an
investigation into the deaths of Russian
Journalists 1993 - 2009' in Moscow to highlight the failure of the
authorities to consistently investigate cases of journalists' murders and to
effectively fight impunity.
The IFJ plans to build on the report
and the online database to support RUJ in its campaign against ongoing violence
to journalists in Russia.
"I salute all of you who continue to honour those
we have lost
to men of violence," added Boumelha. "Together we must work to end impunity and bring their killers to
justice."
For more information contact the IFJ at
+32 2 235 2207
The IFJ represents over 600,000 journalists
in 125 countries worldwide
