His Excellency Aslan Maskhadov
President
Grozny
Chechen Republic
Russian Federation
Vienna, 30 March 1999
Your Excellency,
The International Press Institute strongly condemns the kidnapping of a correspondent working for the Itar-Tass news agency.
According to our sources, unidentified armed men broke into the house of Said Isayev, a Chechen who has worked for the Russian news agency for five years, and seized the journalist on late Sunday, 28 March.
Since the kidnapping of journalists began in January 1997, foreign correspondents have stopped going to Chechnya and media organisations rely on Chechen nationals, but even they are at risk from kidnappers who typically seek large ransoms. In August, 1997, the Russian television station, NTV, paid a ransom of US$ 2 million for the release of TV journalist Elena Masyuk and her two-man crew after 101 days of captivity.
IPI; the global network of editors and media executives, urges Your Excellency to do everything in your power to ensure that Mr. Isayev is freed immediately and that those responsible are brought to justice. We further urge that all possible steps are taken to guarantee safe working conditions for journalists covering events in Chechnya.
We thank you for your attention.
Yours sincerely,
Johann P. Fritz
Director