Investigative reporter assaulted

FEBRUARY 23, 2006
Posted: June 16, 2006

Vladimir Voronov, Novoye Vremya

ATTACKED

Voronov, an investigative reporter for the Moscow weeklies Novoye Vremya and Ezhenedelny Zhurnal, was attacked near his Moscow home in the early hours by two unidentified assailants who escaped, according Russian press reports.

Voronov told the Committee to Protect Journalists that one of the attackers took his cell phone but left his laptop computer, camera and other photographic equipment untouched. Voronov spent nine days in hospital with concussion and a broken nose. He received 15 stitches for face wounds.

Police questioned Voronov and his neighbors. Police refused to consider his journalism as a motive for the attack.. Instead, they classified it as an act of banditry under Article 162 of the Russian criminal code. Doctors told Voronov and the police that the attack was the work of a professional, who used a knuckleduster.

Voronov said he believed that the Russian Security Services (FSB) was behind the attack. He was also assaulted in December 1997. The police did not investigate that attack. Voronov often criticizes the FSB, according to Russian press reports. He wrote a book about the FSB, titled “Sluzhba” (Service).