9 July 2013 

Source: HRO.org (info)

• Dagestan Victims of conflicts Freedom of expression 

Early in the morning on 9 July 2013 in the Semender Village suburb of Makhachkala, the journalist Akhmednabi Akhmednabiev, a columnist for the weekly paper Novoye Delo and a correspondent with the internet portal Caucasian Knot was killed near his home. 

The killing of a journalist is always an evil act. This act is doubly evil as it was committed on the first day of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Akhmednabi Akhmednabiev was one of the few journalists in Dagestan who wrote about the costs of counter-terrorism, about the use of terror as a pretext to persecute whole religious communities, about mass violations of human rights, and about the crimes of the law enforcement agencies.

One cannot escape the feeling that someone is trying to completely close down the already thin supply of accurate information about this side of life in the republic. For some this is the prison cell; for others it is a bullet.

Memorial Human Rights Centre expresses its condolences to the relatives, friends and colleagues of Akhmednabi Akhmednabiev.


An unidentified person fired into Akhmednabi Akhmednabiev’s car 50 metres from his home in the village of Semender, the website of the Investigative Committee reports.

The attack happened at about 07:00 am. The attacker fired numerous shots at the journalist, the Investigative Committee says. Akhmednabiev was hit several times in the head and died on the spot, a source in the Investigative Committee of Dagestan told Interfax.

Investigators have begun to work at the scene of the incident. A number of possible theories for the killing are being considered. The main one is that the killing is related to Akhmednabiev’s professional activities as a journalist, a representative of the Investigative Committee for Dagestan said, Newsru.com reports.

Akhmednabiev worked as first deputy to the chief editor of the newspaper Novoe delo where he headed the politics department. Caucasian Knot writes that the name of Akhmednabiev was on an anonymous list of people threatened with death that was distributed in September 2009 in the Dagestani capital.

There had been two earlier attempts on Akhmednabiev’s life. In May 2012 Akhmednabiev reported he had received threats. The most recent attempt happened a few months ago. On 11 January in Semender unidentified persons shot at Akhmednabiev’s car. However, at that time he was not injured.

A criminal investigation was opened into the unsuccessful attempt to kill Akhmednabiev under Article 167, Section 1 (‘destruction or damage to property with intent’) of the Criminal Code and Article 222, Section 1 (‘Illegal acquisition, transfer, distribution, keeping, transport or carrying weapons’). Akhmednabiev’s lawyer lodged a complaint with the prosecutor’s office in an attempt to obtain the reclassification of the investigation.There had been no response as of 10 July. On this occasion a criminal investigation has been opened into the murder of the journalist under three articles of the Criminal Code: Article 105 (‘murder’), Article 167 (‘damaging property with intent’), and Article 222 (‘illegal trafficking in weapons’). ITAR-TASS reports that the federal-level Investigative Committee is taking the lead in the investigation into the killing of Akhmednabiev.