03.02.09

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev had a meeting on Thursday with Dmitry Muratov, editor of Novaya Gazeta, a Russian daily known for its criticism of the Kremlin and government, and former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, who is a Novaya Gazeta shareholder.

"The president had himself suggested that we meet," Gorbachev told Interfax. "When we came, he said he wanted to take the opportunity to offer his condolences to the Novaya Gazeta staff over the death of the journalist Nastya Baburova."

Anastasia Baburova, a freelance journalist for the paper, was killed as she tried to intervene in an assault in central Moscow on lawyer Stanislav Markelov on January 19. Markelov was shot dead in the attack. Baburova was fatally wounded in the head and died in the hospital.

Gorbachev said Medvedev had asked for his condolences to be passed to the families of Baburova and Markelov. "In the president's opinion, it is a really brazen, outrageous crime," Gorbachev said.

It was also said at the meeting, the former Soviet leader said, that "the situation in the country is quite difficult, that there are those who are taking advantage of this, that instigators of Russophobic and fascist sentiments are trying to rear their head, and that this cannot be ignored."

"I believe that we had a very frank, honest, straightforward conversation," Gorbachev said.

Muratov, Novaya Gazeta's editor, cited Medvedev as saying at the meeting that, as a lawyer by qualification, he had deemed it unacceptable to give any directives to investigators of the murder of Baburova and Markelov.

"Dmitry Medvedev also expressed support for an earlier initiative to create a memorial for victims of Stalin's GULAG," Muratov said.

"The president also said that there is no particular reason to love Novaya Gazeta but that the newspaper must be respected for criticizing authority. I promised that we will keep generating this kind of pleasure," the editor said.

In an interview with Moscow radio station Ekho Moskvy, Muratov said that among the issues raised at the meeting was the state of Russian society, including the status of journalism, and the current trial of men accused of assassinating Novaya Gazeta journalist Anna Politkovskaya in 2006.

Presidential spokeswoman Natalya Timakova confirmed that Medvedev had met with Gorbachev and Muratov but did not say what issues had been raised.

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Source: Interfax