IN MY SHOES: What It's Like To Be A Russian Journalist
In this New York Times op-ed Oleg Kashin, a reporter for the Russian newspaper Kommersant who was savagely beaten by two young men on November 6th just steps from his home, explains why he thinks he was targeted by Nashi, a youth movement associated with “a new level, and acceptance, of violence in Russian politics”:
Members are called “Nashists” by their opponents, as a pun on “fascists,” for good reason. …
I don’t mean to compare myself to Anna Politkovskaya or Paul Klebnikov, journalists who were killed probably because of their investigative work. But in a way the attack against me is more disturbing. Unlike most of the reporters who have been attacked in Russia in recent years, I have not engaged in any serious investigations into corruption or human rights abuses. I have not revealed any secret documents or irritated influential figures with embarrassing material.
What I have done, though, is criticize Nashi. Indeed, all this year I have called attention to the violence that accompanies the group’s every public activity. Even at their legally sanctioned events the members trample - and this is no exaggeration; they literally stomp with their feet — portraits of Russia’s “enemies,” including human rights activists, politicians and journalists. …
Nobody knows for certain whether there is a direct link between the flourishing of Nashi and the increased violence against critics of the state. But it seems indubitable that the atmosphere of hatred and aggression, artificially fomented by the Kremlin, has become the dominant fact in Russian politics, the “reset” in relations with the United States and talk of economic modernization notwithstanding.
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