Anti-Putin Russian journalist Arkady Babchenko shot dead in Ukraine capital
A prominent Russian journalist known for his sharp criticism of Vladimir Putin has been murdered in the Ukrainian capital.
Arkady Babchenko, 41, was found by his wife in a pool of blood at their Kiev apartment on Tuesday evening. He had been shot in the back.
He died in the ambulance on the way to hospital, Ukrainian police said.
Babchenko, who became one of Russia's most famous war correspondents after writing a memoir of his service as a conscript and later professional solider in the Chechen wars, went into exile in 2017 saying he had received multiple threats to himself and his family.
He had emerged as a bitter online critic of the Putin government in recent years, posting regular blogs attacking the Kremlin on his Facebook page. . . The day before his death, Babchenko was worried about Putin & Kadyrov. This is allegedly the 2014 post he referenced in his tweet & then deleted. In it, he says one of Putin's election representatives had asked Kadyrov to "invite me to tea," a veiled threat
.He became the focus of what he called a particular vicious campaign of "political intimidation" after he wrote on Facebook that he had "neither sympathy or pity" for dozens of members of a Russian army choir who died in an air crash en route to Syria in 2016.
Several pro-Kremlin politicians made public calls for him to be publicly punished, including by being stripped of citizenship, deported, or having his property confiscated.
"It was so personal, so scary, that I was forced to flee," he wrote after he had left Russia.
He lived in Prague and Israel before moving to Kiev last summer.
Babchenko's life was defined by his work as a war correspondent to the last.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/0 ... e-capital/
Russia rejects claim it was behind dissident journalist’s killing
Ukraine accuses Moscow of shooting dead Putin critic Arkady Babchenko
The Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, has rejected a Ukrainian allegation that Moscow was behind the murder of a dissident Russian journalist in Kiev, calling it part of an anti-Russian campaign, according to Moscow media reports.
Arkady Babchenko, a critic of President Vladimir Putin
, was shot dead in Ukraine on Tuesday, where he had fled into exile after a series of threats. Police in Kiev said the high-profile murder may have been linked to his reporting. Lavrov said it was “very sad” that Moscow has been accused of the murder, according to Agence France-Presse.
The Ukrainian prime minister, Volodymyr Groysman, said in a social media posting late on Tuesday he was convinced that what he called “the Russian totalitarian machine” had not forgiven Babchenko for what Groysman called his honesty.
Babchenko, a veteran Russian war correspondent, was shot three times in the back as he left his apartment to buy bread. He was found bleeding by his wife. Babchenko, 41, died in the ambulance to the hospital, a government official said.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/ ... -babchenko
