Politkovskaya: A Life for Justice
By Swanee Hunt
October 10, 2006
Everyone needs a hero. Anna Politkovskaya was mine. And others’. In addition to the 2005 Civil Courage Prize, she received the Courage in Journalism Award from the International Women's Media Foundation in 2002, as well as prizes from the Overseas Press Club and Amnesty International. In 2004, she was a joint winner of the Olof Palme Prize for her human rights work.
I met Anna in November, 2000, at Women Waging Peace, a network of about 450 leaders within the Initiative for Inclusive Security, which advocates for the full inclusion of women in peace processes around the world. That initiative was incubated at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. We try to protect and support women peace experts in part by bringing them to the attention of policy makers at the State Department, World Bank, White House, and other halls of power.
This past Saturday Anna was executed: shot point blank in the head with a revolver outside her apartment. The gun was placed by her side, indicating a contract-killing. She was 48.
Born in 1958, Anna graduated from Moscow State University and worked on the Soviet newspaper Izvestiya for more than a decade. In 1999, she joined Novaya Gazeta, one of the few newspapers to take on the Kremlin. She maintained a critical stance against President Putin even as the Russian media became more and more suppressed by the government. Politkovskaya authored several books, including Putin's Russia and The Dirty War. For more than six years, she was the strongest voice in the world describing the plight of Chechnya's civilian population, under military assault by the Russian government since 1994.
She told me once that because she was female, she was considered less threatening and could get behind the lines, where she reported on abuses the army was perpetrating against Muslim communities under cover of fighting terrorism. She described how, to avoid a military checkpoint, she’d made her way down to a river, then trekked through deep snow all night. Another time, she posed as a farm wife sitting on a pile of hay in a wagon; she smiled that without her wire-rims she couldn’t see a thing. Another time she was apprehended by Russian forces but freed as night fell by a sympathetic major. In February 2000, the FSB (former KGB) confined her in a pit in Chechnya without food or water for three days.
Despite those dangers, like many of the women we have sponsored, Anna Politkovskaya kept working to expose the injustices around her. Fearless, but not naïve, she knew her life was on the line as she described the moral decay of 100,000 security forces, whose abuses only spawn more terrorism. Still, she continued to document zachistka ("mop-up"), where young men, or any others considered suspicious, are rounded up from their homes, sometimes tortured, and often executed.
Because of her standing with the Chechens, Politkovskaya acted as a mediator during the Dubrovka Theater siege in Moscow in October 2002. Russian special forces put an end to the two-day stand off when they gassed the theater, killing not only 40 Chechen terrorists but also 129 hostages. Then in September 2004, she was in flight to Rostov to cover the Beslan school hostage crisis when she lost consciousness after drinking a cup of tea. Just before she passed out, a flight attendant whispered to her that she had been poisoned by Russian agents on the plane. Doctors at the hospital in Rostov were ordered to destroy the test results. She believed the FSB was trying to prevent her from reporting on the siege, which resulted in 344 deaths, half of them children. Anna’s suspicions were well-founded: Since 2000, at least twelve Russian journalists have been murdered in contract-style killings.
I last saw Anna in December. She and a small group were discussing the role of women in the security sector, as protectors of human rights, journalists, politicians, and leaders of civil society. They called for women’s solidarity internationally to ensure peace and stability. Anna spoke about freedom of speech and how crucial it is for NGOs to challenge the government. Her words then bear the weight of her sacrifice now.
That day I took two pictures of Anna: the first, somber; the second, her head back, laughing. I think of those two images of her as we mourn her murder and celebrate her life. She understood that with freedom comes responsibility to work for those denied such freedom. As we grieve her death, forty years too soon, we must redouble our efforts and carry forward her legacy.
Swanee Hunt, former US ambassador to Austria, is the director of the Women and Public Policy Program at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and chair of The Initiative for Inclusive Security.
Watch a video of Ambassador Swanee Hunt talking about Anna Politkovskaya
Op-Ed by Ambassador Swanee Hunt: "Anna Politkovskaya Still Wages Peace"
by Swanee Hunt, San Francisco Chronicle
February 4, 2007
Responses from fellow members of the Women Waging Peace Network to Anna's death:
May Blood (Northern Ireland) - The news of Anna Politkovskaya’s murder created sadness for women around the world. It is part of the risk anyone, particularly women, takes when they stand up against injustice. We must hold each other in our thoughts and prayers, and hope to bring help and comfort from knowing that support is there. Sometimes the world can be a very lonely place. The only place to find help and support is by knowing that WE shall make a difference in the lives of people who feel they have no voice. We have to hang onto the thought: WE DO NOT DARE BECAUSE IT IS TOO DIFFICULT, IT IS DIFFICULT BECAUSE WE DO NOT DARE.
Sue Brittion (South Africa) - Thank you for putting into words what I have been feeling… The situation in Chechnya is a current microcosm of the oppression that seems to have been going on for centuries and forever. Always an enemy must be found, to justify greed and lust for power. Always the truth must be covered up. And always, thank God, people like Anna have the courage to go on and speak the truth, putting it into words that touch hearts. As always such people are considered ‘dangerous’. For instance, the church burned witches for three hundred years. We’re more civilized now. But are we? No, we are just more sophisticated at hiding the oppression, torture, rape, and killings. Woe indeed that this is all so skillfully hidden. I hope for strength to those who continue to speak out and write the truth. Thank you, Anna, for being such an example to us all. We lived through this in South Africa, and some of us survived. Let us not fall into a dream and think it never happened, or that it is not happening at this moment, somewhere in the world. Let us never stop the struggle. Aluta continua...
Regine Cirondeye (Burundi) – I appreciate Swanee Hunt's message very much. I was mourning and panicking alone in my corner, as Anna's death reminds me that this can be anyone of us, including myself -- that we are at the front of the line of fire. I was just reading Anna's articles posted on the Internet as a way of cooling my anger. How can we make the world know that Anna is still alive in Europe, in Asia, in Africa, in Oceania, in Antarctica, in North and South America and, most of all, in her home country?
Atema Eclai (Kenya) - How sad it is to hear about Anna. Yet we will not be afraid. As we are raped, tortured, beaten, falsely imprisoned, and assassinated, our work will keep on speaking for rights and justice. We will shake the soil of our graves until the whole world hears our voices. We refuse to be silenced. May Anna's spirit enkindle our work. Once again, I am so sorry. May her courage lead us on!
Fatemeh Haghighatjoo (Iran) - Although I never meet Anna Politkovskaya, when I read her story I cried. She was a woman calling for justice. Although she is not among us now, she is a symbol and her acts teach us to call for justice in the world.
Rebecca Okwaci (Sudan) - I would like to add my voice to the network in regretting the death of Anna. As a journalist, I understand very well the risks we go through but we have to continue talking and writing in order to create a better world of peace and justice. Let us celebrate her life and learn from her experiences and courage.
Zorica Trifunovic (Balkans) - I am deeply distressed because we lost a great friend. This murder is so similar to several murders of journalists in my country. It is as if the same recipe exists... I am very sad and mad. Love to all of you and peace to all of us.
Click here to link to PBS' Independent Lens "Democracy on Deadline: Anna Politkovskaya"
Statement from the White House on the Murder of Russian Journalist Anna Politkovskaya
Like many Russians, Americans were shocked and saddened by the brutal murder of Anna Politkovskaya, a fearless investigative journalist, highly respected in both Russia and the United States. We extend our sympathy and prayers to her family and her friends.
Born in the United States to Soviet diplomats, Anna Politkovskaya cared deeply about her country. Through her efforts to shine a light on human rights abuses and corruption, especially in Chechnya, she challenged her fellow Russians - and, indeed, all of us - to summon the courage and will, as individuals and societies, to struggle against evil and rectify injustices.
We urge the Russian Government to conduct a vigorous and thorough investigation to bring to justice those responsible for her murder.
Interview on ABC's World News Tonight With Charles Gibson
Secretary Condoleezza Rice
Washington, DC
October 10, 2006
QUESTION: Madame Secretary, if I can presume upon your time for just a couple of more minutes, there’s one other thing I want to ask you about. The case of Anna Politkovskaya in Russia; what pressures are the United States bringing to get to the bottom of who killed her?
SECRETARY RICE: Well, first let me say that this woman was a real heroine. She was somebody who was in the best tradition of journalist, who went to the most difficult issues and tried to find out the truth. And it was a sign of a new Russia that she was doing that.
It’s a very sad event and one that needs to be fully and totally investigated by the Russian Government that she was killed in this brutal way. I would hope that the Russian Government understands that everybody is watching, that an investigation of this event is absolutely necessary, because she was the embodiment of what a free press meant in Russia.
QUESTION: We’ve had 13 journalists killed since President Putin assumed that job and we’ve had zero cases solved. A: do you really have any confidence it’s going to be fully investigated? And B: do you have any reason to believe that the Russian Government is simply killing its critics?
SECRETARY RICE: Well, I don’t have any reason to believe that -- or any evidence that the Russian Government is involved, but I think the Russian Government does have a heavy burden to demonstrate that it is both interested in and determined to find the killers of these journalists. You’re right; there have been too many of these and there have been too many that have been unsolved. And so one has to be concerned about the atmosphere and one has to be concerned that the Russian Government will do everything and I just -- I know the international community is saying to the Russian Government that this case and others really, really need to be resolved. There are a number -- the case of Paul Klebnikov is another case where resolution would make a very big difference.
QUESTION: You know Russia well. Is there any free press there left?
SECRETARY RICE: Well, there are multiple small newspapers, but you know, we’ve been very concerned about the fate of the press in Russia. We’ve been very concerned especially about the electronic press, where one gets minimal criticism of very sensitive issues any longer. Russia’s a strong country. It’s a country that is in transition and it’s a country that can stand, that can tolerate, that would benefit from a free press.
And so when we talk to the Russian Government about the need for a free press, it isn’t because anybody wants to see Russia weaker. It’s because it’s our firm belief that a free press would actually make Russia stronger.
For the complete interview, go to http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2006/73809.htm.