In recent days, in Russia, journalists have been forced to resign, detained, and possibly poisoned, in what appears to be a concerted attempt to control the way in which the Beslan hostage crisis is reported.

Raf Shakirov, editor-in-chief of the daily newspaper Izvestiya, resigned on 6 September. In an interview with Radio Liberty, he stated that he was forced to resign after the newspaper’s publisher, Prof-Media, informed him that they did not agree with the newspaper’s coverage of the hostage crisis in Beslan.

The newspaper published a large photo spread of the victims in the 4 September edition, the day after the storming of the school, in order to convey that “this was a war”. The publisher found the edition to be “too emotional” and “too poster-like.”

According to information before IPI, Russian authorities also detained the Moscow bureau chief of the Arab satellite TV channel Al-Arabiya, Amro Abdel Hamid, at the airport in the southern Russian city of Mineralniye Vody. Hamid, an Egyptian who holds a Russian passport, was on his way to Moscow from Beslan, where he was covering the hostage crisis. Al-Arabiya was informed the journalist would be held for two days, but has not been told why he is being detained.

The crew of the Georgian broadcasting company, Rustavi 2, Nana Lezhava and cameraman Levan Tetvadze, were detained on 4 September in Beslan, where they were covering the hostage crisis. On 6 September, local prosecutors officially charged Lezhava and Tetvadze, demanding the two Georgian citizens be sent for ten days’ pre-trial detention. They were accused of crossing the Russian border without a visa. However, as residents of Georgia’s Kazbegi region, and in accordance with the agreement between Russia and Georgia, they have the right to enter North Ossetian territory without a visa.

Two prominent Russian journalists, who have extensively reported on the situation in Chechnya and are known for their critical reports, have been forced to delay their travel to North Ossetia under suspicious circumstances. RFE/RL’s Andrei Babitsky was first detained at Moscow’s Vnukovo Airport when authorities accused him of carrying explosives in his luggage, and then, after no explosives were found on him, he was detained after two men sought to provoke a fight while he was waiting for his flight. All three men were detained and Babitsky was charged with “hooliganism” and sentenced to five days in jail.

Anna Politkovskaya, a correspondent for Novaya gazeta, became ill after drinking tea during the first part of her flight to Beslan. She was diagnosed with acute food poisoning at a clinic in Rostov and returned to Moscow for treatment. Politkovskaya’s colleagues said she had not eaten anything else that day. According to reports, the Novaya gazeta journalists were initially prevented from boarding their flight, but the captain of another flight recognised Politkovskaya and welcomed her on board.

IPI Director Johann P. Fritz said, “Following on from the attempts at massaging the media both during and after the Kursk tragedy in 2000 and the Moscow Theatre siege in 2002, it appears that the authorities are once again seeking to conceal information from the public and limit the free flow of information.”

“Not only is there continuing confusion about the numbers held hostage and those murdered by the terrorists, there appear to have been attempts at preventing certain journalists from travelling to the region. In addition, other journalists who may have upset the authorities with their own reports have been either detained or punished.”

“I fear the recent spate of press freedom violations go back to the adoption of the Doctrine of the Information Security of the Russian Federation in 2000 which called for ‘[the need to develop] special legal and organisational mechanisms to prevent unlawful information and psychological influences on the mass consciousness.'”

“Bearing in mind the doctrine, I think it is possible to see elements of the state security apparatus acting to prevent reporting that might be embarrassing to the state.”

“The Beslan hostage crisis is an appalling tragedy. However, censorship will not help the Russian authorities in making sure that there is no repetition of such a terrible event. If Russia is to learn from events in recent days, it must be honest and truthful; it must allow the media to report freely and it must encourage the free flow of information. The Russian people have a fundamental right to know how this event happened.”