Vyacheslav Gorodetsky is under growing pressure from Russian security services, but has no plans to close down his Murmansk news office. Photo: private
Vyacheslav Gorodetsky says the six security service officers that raided his newspaper office in downtown Murmansk confiscated computers and telephones and threatened to shoot him. But the editor of the Arktichesky Obozrevatel (Arctic Observer) has no plans to leave the north Russian city.
June 18, 2024
“As long as I am alive, as long as I am able to do something, as long as the situation is as it is — I will stay here,” Gorodetsky says in an interview with the Russian version of the Barents Observer.
“If I leave, who will then tell people the truth?” the experienced journalist adds.
On the 11th of June, six officers - two of them with masks - made their way into the editorial office of the small online newspaper in Murmansk. They were armed and openly threatened the news editor.
“One of the masked men came up to me, looked me into the eyes and said that if I resist, they had an order to shoot,” Gorodetsky says.
Following a comprehensive search of the newsroom, the editor was taken to the local FSB headquarter.
In a comment in his own newspaper, Gorodetsky calls the raid “a masquerade.”
Vyacheslav Gorodetsky has been newspaper editor in Murmansk for two decades. In 2005, he founded the B-Port, a news agency that soon developed into a leading newsmaker in the north Russian region. In 2020, he resigned following what he described as “growing censorship from regional authorities.”
«The situation is such that our news arena is rapidly changing, and not in a good direction,» Gorodetsky said at the time.
Later that same year, he established the Arktichesky Obozrevatel, a small two-person newsroom.
It is not that first time that repressive law enforcement authorities take action against Gorodetsky and the Arktichesky Obozrevatel. In April 2023, police conducted a search in the news desk following a request from an official in the regional government. A criminal case followed.
The news editor was not surprised that the FSB agents again made their way into his office, but he did not expect the timing.
“We assumed that this could happen in the run-up to the presidential election. […] Back then, it could be explained, but I do not know why it happened now,” he says.
The FSB reportedly accuses Gorodetsky of collecting ‘secret’ information about issues of national security. But the editor strongly refuses that his media assembles information relating to the war.
“We have never done anything like that. I do ask many questions in press conferences. But it is not right that I publish this information, because I perfectly well understand the risks. But I ask questions, unpleasant questions,” Gorodetsky says.
Russian journalist’s flat raided in Moscow
The search could be connected to the case on “extremism” against Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation.
Artyem Kriger has been covering anti-government protests in Moscow for several years. Photo: Artyem Kriger facebook
By Elizaveta Vereykina
BARENTS OBSERVER
The independent Russian news outlet Sota.Vision reported that their Moscow correspondent Artyem Kriger’s flat in Moscow has been searched by Russian Investigative Commette this morning. The journalist has been taken for questioning. His colleagues and family suggest that the search is part of the long going witch-hunt against Alexei Navalny Anti-Corrruption foundation that was designated as “extremist” by Russian authorities in 2021:
“During the search he was asked if he knew Navalny”, SotaVision reported in their Telegram channel.
Alexei Navalny was the Russian opposition leader, who died in a Russian prison on February 16.
Sota.Vision cites Atyem’s brother - Alexander Kriger - who was present in the flat during the raid:
“They (the law enforcement) came at 6 am, put me on the floor, later allowed me to sit down. They divided everyone into different rooms, Artyom and his mother were taken to his room, and they gave some kind of paper with an order. They conducted a search, checked all the electronics, took press cards, mobile and data storage devices,” - Artyem’s brother told journalists.
According to Alexander Kriger, the search lasted about 4 hours in course of which the security forces mentioned “participation in a terrorist organization.” Artem, as his brother recollects, was given a list of names by security forces and asked if he knew those people. The younger Kriger told Sota.Vision that the Russian opposition leader’s name Navalny was among them.
Artyem Kriger has been covering news for Sota.Vision for several years. In September 2022 he was detained live on air while covering anti-war protests on the streets of Moscow. Back then authorities accused the journalist of “participating in unauthorised protest” and he had to spend 10 days in a Moscow detention centre.
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