Murdered Reporter Was Writing Torture Story
Russia Investigates Whether  She Was Killed Over Her Reporting
By HENRY MEYER, AP

MOSCOW (Oct. 8) - Russia pledged Sunday to hunt down the killers of  
crusading journalist Anna Politkovskaya but her colleagues said they will mount  their 
own investigation, certain she was killed because of her critical  reporting 
of President Vladimir Putin's war in Chechnya.

As the European Union and the U.S. demanded a thorough probe, there was  
skepticism that the authorities would ever uncover the culprits of the latest in  
a series of slayings of journalists in Russia under Putin, who has been  
increasingly accused of rolling back post-Soviet freedoms since he came to power  
in 2000.
Politkovskaya, famed for her unsparing coverage of abuses against  civilians 
in the war-ravaged Russian region of Chechnya, was found dead Saturday  in the 
elevator of her Moscow apartment building from two gunshot wounds - one  to 
the head. She was 48.
Suspicion fell on Moscow-backed Chechen strongman  Ramzan Kadyrov - whose 
forces are accused of abductions and torture - but he  described her death as a 
"great tragedy," ITAR-Tass reported.

Prosecutor-General Yury Chaika personally took charge of the investigation,  
his office said Sunday, citing the "particular importance (of the case) and 
its  wide resonance within society."
The investigation will focus on possible  links between the killing and 
Politkovskaya's work, Marina Gridneva, a  spokeswoman for the Prosecutor-General's 
office, said Sunday.
"I assure you  that investigators and our colleagues from the Interior 
Ministry will do  everything to ensure that the killers of Anna Politkovskaya, the 
perpetrators as  well as those who ordered it, are found soon," she said in 
comments broadcast on  state television.
Politkovskaya's death was the most high-profile slaying of  a journalist in 
Russia since the July 2004 assassination of Paul Klebnikov, the  U.S.-born 
editor of the Russian edition of Forbes magazine. That crime was  believed linked 
to Klebnikov's investigation of the murky business world in  Russia but 
remains unresolved; two ethnic Chechens accused of carrying it out  were acquitted 
earlier this year.

Politkovskaya's newspaper, the biweekly Novaya Gazeta, whose reporters are  
to investigate her death, called it a revenge killing for her coverage of  
Chechnya. Her editors said she was due Monday to publish an investigative  article 
about torture and kidnappings in Chechnya based on witness accounts and  
photos of tortured bodies.
"We never got the article, but she had evidence  about these (abducted) 
people and there were photographs," Deputy Editor Vitaly  Yerushensky, told Ekho 
Moskvy radio.
Oleg Orlov, of Russia's main human  rights group, Memorial, said that he was 
certain Politkovskaya, whose reporting  put her on a collision course with the 
authorities but won her numerous  international awards, was killed on the 
orders of those responsible for abuses  in Chechnya.
"For me it's clear that directly or indirectly this was done by  people who 
have carried out state terror, the terror that we see in the North  Caucasus," 
Orlov told The Associated Press.
Politkovskaya, one of the few  Russian journalists writing about widespread 
human rights abuses in Chechnya,  had been a persistent critics of Kadyrov, the 
region's Moscow-backed prime  minister.

Politkovskaya also angered other powerful people - including the Russian  
military - with her investigative reporting and human rights advocacy.
Novaya  Gazeta said on its Web site it believed her murder was either revenge 
by Kadyrov  or an attempt to discredit him.
In a recent radio interview, Politkovskaya  said she was a witness in a 
criminal case against Kadyrov concerning his alleged  involvement in the kidnapping 
of two civilians - an ethnic Russian and a Chechen  - who were tortured and 
killed.
On Sunday, dozens of well-wishers came to lay  flowers outside the entrance 
to Politkovskaya's apartment block in downtown  Moscow and placed flowers and 
candles outside the newspaper's offices.

Hundreds meanwhile rallied in Moscow's Pushkin Square on Sunday to protest  
her murder as well as the Russian crackdown on Georgians since a spy row 
erupted  last week.
Underneath a photograph of Politkovskaya, one poster read: "The  Kremlin has 
killed freedom of speech."
Her killing underlined the  increasingly dangerous environment for 
journalists working in Russia. It brings  to at least 13 the number of journalists 
killed in contract-style killings in  the past six years, according to the New 
York-based Committee to Protect  Journalists.
Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev condemned Politkovskaya's  killing as 
"a blow to the entire, democratic, independent press," Interfax  said.
In Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the  
United States was "shocked and profoundly saddened" by her death, praising her  
"shining a light on human rights abuses and other atrocities of the war in  
Chechnya" and the plight of Chechen refugees.

The European Union and the Council of Europe, a leading human rights  
watchdog whose executive body currently is led by Russia, called for a  convincing 
investigation.
Politkovskaya had been under repeated threat. In  2004, she fell seriously 
ill with symptoms of food poisoning after drinking tea  on a flight from Moscow 
to southern Russia during the school hostage crisis in  Beslan. Her colleagues 
suspected it was an attempt on her life.
Politkovskaya  began reporting on Chechnya in 1999 during Russia's second 
military campaign  there, concentrating less on military engagements than on the 
human side of the  war.
Russia has largely brought the rebellious southern territory under  control, 
but it remains locked in conflict with a hardcore of separatist rebels,  and 
allegations of kidnappings, torture and murder of civilians blamed on  Russian 
forces and their Chechen allies persist.
Politkovskaya is survived by  two adult children.
 

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