Russian Journalist plans to write about Russia selling arms to Iran and Syria
And takes a five-story dive out of his window.
From
SF Gate:
Russia Journalist Worked on Weapons Story
A journalist who fell to his death from a fifth-story window had received threats while gathering material for a report claiming Russia planned to provide sophisticated weapons to Syria and Iran, his newspaper said Tuesday.
Prosecutors have opened an inquest into the death of Ivan Safronov, a military affairs writer for the daily Kommersant who died Friday in what some media said could have been murder.
Kommersant reported that Safronov told his editors he would write a story about Russian plans to sell weapons to Iran and Syria via Belarus, but they said he had not yet submitted the article.
Kommersant said Safronov recently told colleagues that he had been warned he would face a criminal investigation on charges of revealing state secrets if he reported allegations that Russia had struck a deal to supply highly advanced Iskander missiles to Syria. If confirmed, such a contract would upset the balance of forces in the Mideast and likely anger Israel and the United States.
Safronov did not say where the warning came from, according to Kommersant, but he had repeatedly been questioned in the past by the Federal Security Service or FSB, which suspected him of divulging state secrets in his reports. The FSB is the main successor agency to the KGB.
"Ivan Safronov said he was not going to write about it for a while because he was warned that it would create a huge international scandal and the FSB would launch a criminal case on charges of breaching state secrets," it said.
A bit more:
A spokeswoman for the Rosoboronexport state arms trading monopoly refused to comment on Kommersant's report on the alleged weapons deals.
Russia has been plagued by attacks on reporters who seek to expose official corruption and other abuses. The problem was highlighted by the October killing of Anna Politkovskaya, an investigative reporter and a harsh critic of human rights abuses in Chechnya.
A report Tuesday from the Brussels-based International News Safety Institute listed Iraq, Russia and Colombia as the deadliest countries for journalists and their support staff. There were 138 deaths in Iraq over the past decade, 88 in Russia and 72 in Colombia, the report said.
Seems like the old Russia is coming back into power. Looks like
Pootie--Poot isn't a solid friend of the US any more.
Posted by DaveH at March 6, 2007 1:18 PM