Older blog entries for ilgiz (starting at number 18)

BBC's change of strategy

British journalist, former editor of the Russian Features department in BBC Masha Karp wrote that she received a written warning over airing a programme "The Life and Death of Alexander Litvinenko" December 18, 2006. Her managers found that the programme presented "much stronger and detailed arguments from one side of the discussion and under-represent[ed] the other". In a phone call the day after airing, a senior BBC Russian Service editor told her that "pro-Kremlin guys sound stupid and Bukovsky and the others sound intelligent".[1]

Karp wrote that BBC closed her department and removed the need to broadcast opinions "not heard on the state-controlled media" from its strategy.

One year later Martin Dewhirst, University of Glasgow, and Victor Suvorov complained about BBC Russian Service's lack of impartiality. In their letter to the complaints unit of the corporation they mentioned that Deputy Head of the region and Editor-in-Chief of the service could have regular contacts with KGB in the past.[2]

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[1] BBC plays by the Kremlin's Rules: Masha Karp, November 2010, Standpoint Magazine, http://standpointmag.co.uk/node/3492/full

[2] Letter to the Editorial Complaints Unit of the BBC from Martin Dewhirst, Department of Slavonic Studies, University of Glasgow and Viktor Suvorov, Committee on Foreign Affairs, Minutes of Evidence, http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmselect/cmfaff/50/7062714.htm

Syndicated 2010-11-10 20:52:15 from Ilguiz (eel ghEEz) Latypov

Assaults on opposition members in Russia

Human rights defender Yelena Vasilyeva, one of the top members of the Solidarnost opposition movement in Russia, was assaulted on her way back from the regional opposition conference in Tambov on April 5. Miss Vasilyeva helped free Larisa Arap in 2007.

A man approached her in the train and hit her into the chest adding, "we will unteach you from visiting Tambov region".

http://www.svobodanews.ru/content/article/1604731.html
(computer translation)

This happened less than a week after another prominent opposition figure, Lev Ponomaryov, was severely beaten on the way to his apartment in Moscow. Mr Ponomaryov carried civil investigations of human rights violations including the 2004 mass police mop-up in Blagoveschensk, Bashkiria.

Syndicated 2009-04-07 22:04:06 (Updated 2009-09-01 15:45:32) from Ilguiz (eel ghEEz) Latypov

ghee @ 2008-11-14T23:50:00

Just some 150 years ago a theory that newborns died from "cadaverous particles" brought on to them after autopsies was considered backward.

The physician who found the cause-effect link felt misunderstood and died from pyemia after a severe beating in the psychiatric asylum, according to references in a Wikipedia page on Ignaz Semmelweis,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis

This mildly contradicts an article in a Russian pop magazine. The article says that the physician "died" after his spirits were broken and that his colleagues considered his idea anti-religious. But the references in the above page tell about his colleagues thinking that his idea was rooted in old beliefs.

Syndicated 2008-11-15 04:51:12 (Updated 2008-11-15 18:44:37) from Ilguiz (eel ghEEz) Latypov

ghee @ 2008-06-16T08:04:00

I am mesmerized by the late Russian royal family. I was not aware about their lives and deeds until recently.

G.D. Olga Alexandrovna was daughter of Princess Dagmar of Denmark and Alexander III. The other child of the pair, Nicholas, Olga's elder brother, later became Czar Nicholas II.

G.D. Elizabeth Feodorovna was daughter of British Princess Alice and G.D. Ludvig IV. Princess Alice was daughter of Queen Victoria. Elizabeth's younger sister Princess Alix (Alexandra Feodorovna) was Czar Nicholas's wife.

G.D. Olga escaped to Denmark, then lived a modest life in Campbellville (Canada), then Cooksville, then Toronto. Her mother, Princess Dagmar (Maria Fyodorovna) survived son's execution by 10 years.

According to Trotsky's diary, it was Lenin and Sverdlov who ordered the execution of Czar's family. (Alexis Scherbatow, The New York Times, July 17, 1991) To this day, Russian government denies such orders were made.

Czar with his immediate family and G.D. Elizabeth with others were killed by Bolsheviks 17-18 July 1918 in Yekaterinburg's Ipatiev House and in a mining pit 18 km from Alapaevsk's Napolnaya School on the road to Siniachikha.

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Update: The descendants' lawyer obtained the acknowledgment that the killings in the Ipatiev House were acts of political repression that need rehabilitation.

Syndicated 2008-06-16 13:26:31 (Updated 2008-10-01 11:46:08) from Ilguiz (eel ghEEz) Latypov

ghee @ 2007-12-06T22:39:00

"Запишись в группу избирателей в поддержку выдвижения Владимира Буковского на пост Президента РФ"

Syndicated 2007-12-07 03:39:27 (Updated 2009-09-22 01:44:04) from Ilguiz (eel ghEEz) Latypov

ghee @ 2007-12-03T02:05:00

I forgot my passport and was late for the Russian elections in Toronto last Sunday. I was going to vote for Yabloko. According to the "official", state-propaganda-affected data, Yabloko scored between 1 and 2%. I can't believe the government party scored 70% in the poll stations abroad, higher than in Russia itself. The 99% scored by it in the raped and killed Chechnya is also appalling.

When I talked and communicated with few friends and acquaintances in the last 24 hours, it was a pleasure to find common grounds and share some plans with them.

Syndicated 2007-12-03 07:07:03 (Updated 2007-12-03 07:09:28) from Ilguiz (eel ghEEz) Latypov

I am worried about the sale of LiveJournal to SUP. Here is a picture worth many words I copied from someone else. It is a Stalin's portrait in the social realism style, with a question, "'sup?" ("What's up?") flying off his mouth.



In the good news, I found it important that Wikimedia and Advogato are officially not-for-profit, unlike LiveJournal.

Syndicated 2007-12-03 06:22:36 from Ilguiz (eel ghEEz) Latypov

ghee @ 2007-11-28T20:11:00

Vladimir Mukusev, one of the glasnost pioneers in Russian TV, says he was turned away from working as a journalist and lost his colleagues who battled against corruption.

"It is horrible that I had three friends. One friend's name was Yuri Schekochihin, the other's was Artyom Borovik, the third one's was Anna Politkovskaya. All of them have been doing journalist investigations. And they used this very freedom of speech not to enshrine their names but rather to stop the powers putting on fat. I think this is why these people were killed. And not only the journalists. One can place my other friend into the same row, Galya [Galina] Starovoitova. Because she also used any opportunity of freedom of speech. But today the freedom of speech is shrinking and dying... And it will not be able to appear from nowhere by itself!"

"Ужас в том, что у меня было три друга. Одного звали Юрий Щекочихин, другого — Артем Боровик, третьего — Анна Политковская. Все они занимались журналистскими расследованиями. И все эту самую свободу слова использовали не для того, чтобы свое имя увековечить в памяти, а не дать власти жиреть. Думаю, что поэтому этих людей уничтожили. И не только журналистов. В этот же ряд можно поставить и еще одного моего друга — Галю Старовойтову. Она ведь тоже использовала любую возможность свободы слова. Но сегодня, как шагреневая кожа, свобода слова умирает… И появиться ниоткуда, сама по себе, она не может!"

http://www.lenizdat.ru/a0/ru/pm1/c-1056380-0.html

Syndicated 2007-11-29 01:41:00 (Updated 2007-11-29 02:05:22) from Ilguiz (eel ghEEz) Latypov

ghee @ 2007-11-19T17:26:00

I was always surprised with the low number of investigative journalism articles in Canadian newspapers. I don't know if there is a thin line between investigation and advocacy. The [[Advocacy journalism]] article reflects on ethics and objectivity and whether journalists have to remain neutral.

Recently, the Ontario Court of Appeal allowed journalists to make honest mistakes (The Record, November 19, 2007). But the article says Canadian journalists may still face the a fine or a jail term for not disclosing their sources.

If I understand correctly, RCMP searched Juliet O'Neill's house and workplace to find her source in RCMP's ranks which leaked details on false allegations against Maher Arar. The news story said the charges against the journalist could mean a 14-year jail sentence. Thanks to the democratic system, common sense prevailed in that case. However, I would like to know if people behind the false allegations and forceful deportation of Arar were identified. I would like to know the RCMP's whistle blower's motives and whether he or she was protected from persecution.

Syndicated 2007-11-19 22:53:48 (Updated 2011-04-21 17:42:44) from Ilguiz (eel ghEEz) Latypov