August 3, 2005
USEFUL FOOLS
US TV network banned by Russia (Margreet Strijbosch, Radio Netherlands, August 3rd 2005)
Russia is to ban US television network ABC from operating inside its borders. On Tuesday, the foreign ministry in Moscow announced that the accreditation of ABC’s journalists would not be renewed, after the station’s US transmission of an interview with Russia’s most wanted terrorist, Chechen rebel Shamil Basayev.The controversial interview was actually recorded in June by Russian journalist Andrei Babitsky, who was himself abducted in Chechnya a few years ago, while working for Radio Free Europe in Prague. He regards the Russian response to the item as ‘shocking’ and ‘ill-advised", and commented, "if there had not been such a fierce reaction, it would have been forgotten by now."
However, as a Russian journalist, he is fairly used to such things. Under President Vladimir Putin, an ever-tighter muzzle has been placed on the country’s media. At present, there is still only one truly independent newspaper, Novaya Gazeta, and one radio station, Echo Moskvy. Mr Babitsky was even arrested a year ago as he made his way to Beslan, where a school full of children was the scene of a mass hostage-taking incident, carried out on the orders of the very same Shamil Basayev.
This, however, is the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union that the Kremlin has reacted so furiously to a foreign media organisation, as Martin MacCauley, a British expert on Russian affairs at the University of London, confirms:
"It is unprecedented. Nothing like this has happened since the fall of communism in 1991. We are really going back to the pre-glasnost era, to the era of Brezhnev, when journalists could be declared persona non-grata. This is a very serious step, because it underlines the fury and dismay of the Russian authorities that ABC - an important American network - should give Shamil Basayev airtime and allow him to articulate his demands and accusations and - if you like - to legitimate his policy."
Yet it is not unusual for terrorists to be seen and heard in the international media. Stations such as al-Jazeera and CNN have, for example, broadcast tapes featuring Osama bin Laden. An interview with a terrorist is not, in itself, an act of terrorism, and may provide some insight into the way they think. The controversial ABC provides an example, inasmuch as Shamil Basayev can be seen wearing a T-shirt with the word ‘anti-terrorist’ printed on it. He believes that Russia is guilty of terrorism in Chechnya, and that this makes him an anti-terrorist. He, though, is responsible for multiple attacks in Russia, in which hundreds of adults and children lost their lives.
Perhaps the Russians think the war on terrorism is really a war.
Posted by Peter Burnet at August 3, 2005 9:35 PMthen why are they providing the iranians with nuclear weaponry ?
Posted by: cjm at August 4, 2005 12:09 AMAt least they recognize who is not their friend. The leftists are always good about media, but questionable about objective reality.
Posted by: jd watson at August 4, 2005 5:14 AMThere's an article about Chechnya in one of the recent National Geographics in which a Russian general explains Russia's policy of fighting the Chechens. It goes something like this:
--If they fire at us from a house, we destroy the house. If they fire at us from a city, we destroy the city--
Perhaps they really do think there's a war going on.
Posted by: Quack Corleone at August 4, 2005 6:14 AMThe Iranians are receiving the fruits of Soviet technology?
Hmmm. The Mullahs better check those measurements carefully, lest something go "wrong". (And by "wrong" I mean "right".)
The Lady from Radio Netherlands could have replaced her entire article with one word: Beslan.
Posted by: Mikey at August 4, 2005 7:32 AMPutin is playing a double-game here that must get irritating to rational thinking Russians. He claims to be fighting terror, yet he opposed American involvement in Iraq and he is selling nuclear technology to Iran. It gets even more puzzling when one realizes that his main competition for hearts and minds in the 'Stans' is Iran. You would think he would have frozen Iran out almost completely.
'Tis a puzzlement.
Posted by: bart at August 4, 2005 7:36 AMHe probably needs the dough and it makes sense to build up a regional counterweight in the ME to the USA. Iran is too far away from the Stans to have much influence.
Posted by: Ali Choudhury at August 4, 2005 7:46 AMIranian money and social service workers are all over the place in Azerbaijan, Kyrgyztan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan.
Iran borders Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan.
Posted by: bart at August 4, 2005 8:39 AMThe important ones are Uzbekistan and Kazakhastan.
I don't think there's much of an Iranian presence there.
Posted by: Ali Choudhury at August 4, 2005 9:41 AMif the iranians can project influence into kosovo, which they have, then i don't think it's too much of a stretch for them to do the same for Uzbekistan and Kazakhastan. and what are the chances that the iranians are helping the chechens ?
it's worth noting that putin was publicly and loudly excluded from the recent Breslan memorial. he is an incompetent poseur of the worst kind. Yeltsin was/is ten times the statesman putin is.
hopefully the first terrorist nuke will go off in moscow, and take putin with it. karma is a bitch.
Azerbaijan is a major oil producer that the Russians still see as integral to their national identity. I'm not sure about Uzbekistan, but Kazhakstan is half Russian ethnically and the ruler keeps a very tight lid on things with extensive aid from both the US and Russia.
Turkmenistan is potentially a major energy exporter analogous to Saudi Arabia. It is headed by a despot, Turkmenbashi, who has inter alia, named the months of the year after himself, and steals everything that isn't nailed down. This is a prime area for Iranian exploitation, as even the loopiest mullah would seem like a vast improvement. Israel, the US, Turkey and Russia all have a presence there.
Posted by: bart at August 4, 2005 2:38 PM