Is Journalism Worth Dying For?: Final Dispatches (66 page)

Dagestan
: located in the southernmost part of Russia, in the North Caucasus mountains. Ethnically very diverse.

Georgia
: the first republic to declare its independence from Russia, shortly before the collapse of the USSR. Separatist problems with Abkhazia and South Ossetia in particular are fomented by Russia. Rich in natural resources, attractive to tourists and famed for its wine-making, Georgia is combating corruption, which holds back the economy.

Ingushetia
: comprises mainly Sunni Muslims of various Sufi orders. It has many refugees from the war in Chechnya. Population of half a million made up of 77 per cent Ingushes, 20 per cent Chechens and 1.2 per cent Russians.

Rose Revolution
: a series of protests in Georgia in late 2003 to early 2004 in response to massive rigging of the parliamentary elections of November 2003. President Eduard Shevardnadze’s inability to cope with separatist problems and pervasive corruption caused him to lose the election to Mikheil Saakashvili. Shevardnadze claimed victory, but was forced to concede defeat after the Parliament building was seized by Saakashvili’s supporters, bearing roses as a symbol of non-violence; elite military units sided with the protesters. The election was re-run in January 2004 and Saakashvili’s party won by a landslide.

Ukraine
: declared independence from Moscow in 1991, but was slow to implement free-market reforms; heavily dependent on Russia for energy supplies, which Russia has attempted to exploit for political advantage. Its population of 46 million is 78 per cent Ukrainian and 17 per cent Russian.

Wahhabism
: the dominant form of Islam in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and western Iraq, which advocates a puritanical and legalistic stance in matters of faith and religious practice. Russian-speaking Wahhabi Arabs flooded Chechnya at the end of the First Chechen War, allowing the Russian Government subsequently to present Chechnya as a bridgehead of Islamic fundamentalism

Table of Contents

About the Author

Other Books by This Author

Copyright

Contents

Epigraph

So What am I Guilty Of?

1. Should Lives Be Sacrificed to Journalism?

2. The War in Chechnya

Part I: Dispatches from the Frontline

Part II: The Protagonists

Part III: The Kadyrovs

3. The Cadet

4. Nord-Ost

Photo Insert

5. Beslan

6. Russia: A Country at Peace

7. Planet Earth: The World Beyond Russia

8. The Other Anna

9. The Last Pieces

10. After October 7

Glossary