The Dark Side Is Just As Dante Saw It

Michael Hedges February 10, 2020 - Follow on Twitter

Reaching into dark corners is the charge of investigative reporters. Perhaps it comes from curiosity or mission. Other motivations have been suggested given the netherworld’s realities. Confronting the dark side is life affirming, in a sense. Behold the beast.

Russian investigative reporter Elena Milashina and human rights lawyer Marina Dubrovina were accosted this past week (February 6), beaten late at night by a group of people at a hotel in Grozny, Chechnya. They were slammed to the floor and kicked. One in the group video recorded the assault, apparently to provide a record of the deed. Ms Dubrovina was in Grozny for a court appearance, representing a disabled local Grozny blogger jailed on dubious charges. Ms Milashina is affiliated with independent Moscow news outlet Novaya Gazeta and reports on human rights issues, including in Chechnya.

"It was co-ordinated, orchestrated," Ms Milashina said to BBC Russian (February 7). "These were thugs, provocateurs; female thugs carried out this punitive attack. They were young women, girls, and the men were standing close by and giving them instructions." One in the group of attackers accused the pair of “defending Wahhabis,” the ultraconservative Islamic sect and official religious doctrine practiced in Saudi Arabia that is also prominent in Chechnya.

“It is difficult for me to count how many times I personally received public threats from Ramzan Kadyrov,” she said to news portal Meduza (February 7). The attackers, she suspects, had been following her location on social media. Ramzan Kadyrov is Head of the Chechen Republic, a position he established, succeeding Alu Alkhanov, who was dismissed by Russian Federation president Vladimir V. Putin. Mr. Alkhanov succeeded Akhmad Kadyrov, father of the current leader, who was assassinated in 2004.

Ramzan Kadyrov has long railed against critics, journalists and human rights organizations. Those who cross his path have been imprisoned, tortured and murdered. He has singled out gay rights supporters as “foreign agents.” In 2017 Ms Milashina and Elena Kostiuchenko, for Novaya Gazeta, reported on a campaign to torture and kidnap gay men in Chechnya. After publication, Mr. Kadyrov announced there were “no gay men in Chechnya” and Ms Milashina went into hiding outside Russia for several months. A documentary film built around that story - Welcome To Chechnya - debuted at the Sundance Film Festival in January. It will air on HBO this summer, probably not in Chechnya.

Mr. Kadyrov’s reach, so to speak, is not limited to Chechnya. Four days before the Grozny assault on Ms Milashina and Ms Dubrovina Chechen video blogger Imran Aliev was murdered, beheaded actually, in a Lille, France hotel room. Described as “eccentric and divisive,” he had posted YouTube videos railing about Mr. Kadyrov and Mr. Putin. Several years ago he had relocated to Belgium. French authorities have no suspects. A year earlier a former Chechen militia commander was murdered in Berlin.

Novaya Gazeta chief editor Dmitry Muratov said reporting from Chechnya will continue. A previous Novaya Gazeta investigative reporter who extensively covered Chechnya - Anna Politkovskaya - was murdered in Moscow in 2006. Three Chechen brothers were sentenced for the killing in 2014, though who ordered the contract hit has never been identified.

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