[PEN-L:365] Clampdown on Russia's Left Newspapers

[Gregory Schwartz <grishas@xxxxxxxx>]

Left Papers Commit To 'National Liberation Struggle'

Sovetskaya Rossiya
21 July 1998
[translation for personal use only]
Letter by Sovetskaya Rossiya Chief Editor V. Chikin and Zavtra
Chief Editor A. Prokhanov:  "From the Patriotic Information
Bureau"

  According to reports from circles close to the Presidential Staff,
Deputy Chief of Staff Savostyanov, who is famous for his failures during

the initial stages of the Chechen War and his indefatigable combating of

"political extremism," is initiating the closure of the opposition
newspapers Sovetskaya Rossiya and Zavtra.
  The unconstitutional Chamber for Information Disputes has already
called for Sovetskaya Rossiya's "public flogging," while Zavtra's
editorial
office has been sent two warnings from the Press Ministry which give the

latter the right to start a procedure to close it down.  In accordance
with
Savostyanov's aim, the Justice Ministry department in charge of public
organizations has been instructed to monitor the suppression procedures,

while Federal Security Service [FSB] staff, who have twice drafted
memorandums which do not recommend the closure of the Russia-wide
opposition newspapers, are obliged to collect "compromising material" on

them.  However, the persecution continues and forms part of a general
project for the establishment of a so-called liberal dictatorship
whereby
the authorities intend to suppress the people's growing opposition and
crush opposition protest. Criminal prosecution of miners picketing the
railroads has already been initiated.  General Rokhlin, one of the most
consistent opponents of the regime, has been murdered.  A secret Yeltsin

edict has been signed establishing within the FSB a directorate for the
"protection of the constitutional system," whose structure is a carbon
copy
of the KGB Fifth Directorate and is aimed at combating dissent.  It is
now
the turn of the opposition press, which expresses the opinion of 80
percent
of the population.
  The source of the extremism for which Sovetskaya Rossiya and Zavtra
are blamed is actually the policy of a regime which has enriched a
handful
of money-grabbers and bribe-takers, a policy which carries away 1.5
million
of the Russian population every year, suppresses any manifestations of
Russian self-consciousness, and openly sows class, religious, and ethnic

discord.
  The extremist is Savostyanov himself, whose hands were freed by the
bloody slaughter in the Caucasus, which led to the deaths of hundreds of

thousands of people, the devastation of cities, and, ultimately, to
Chechnya's unconstitutional, de facto secession from Russia.
  The editorial boards of Rossiya and Zavtra, which repeatedly suffered
outright high-handedness and closedowns in 1991 and 1993, assure their
readers that they will remain the print organs of the national
liberation
struggle, which is expanding across Russia's expanses.
  [Signed}  V. Chikin, chief editor of Sovetskaya Rossiya
  Prokhanov, chief editor of Zavtra

--
Gregory Schwartz
Department of Political Science
York University
4700 Keele St.
Toronto, Ontario
M3J 1P3
Canada

Tel: (416) 736-5265
Fax: (416) 736-5686
Web: http://www.yorku.ca/dept/polisci