Moscow Times

January 5, 2000

IN CHECHNYA, A WAR AGAINST THE PRESS

By Yevgenia Borisova

Staff Writer

ASSINOVSKAYA, Chechnya -- In addition to keeping a lookout for Chechen fighters, Russian troops in Chechnya are alert for other threats: videotapes, notebooks and unsupervised reporters.

At checkpoints like the one at Assinovskaya on the road toward Grozny from Nazran, Ingushetia, soldiers searched cars not just for weapons and guerrillas. Videotapes were confiscated, the excuse being that the checkpoint lacked a VCR to screen them. Every page of written matter was scrutinized.

By means of bureaucracy, searches and intimidation, the military is fighting an information war to influence how the conflict is seen by the public. It is a crucial issue because Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's popularity is generally viewed as a result of the war's perceived success.

The result of the military's effort: much blander coverage than during the 1994-96 war, when hard-hitting television and newspaper coverage by Russian and foreign journalists helped swing public opinion against the war.

The detention by military officials of seven foreign journalists last week highlights the difficulties reporters are having in getting an accurate picture of events that might enable them to challenge sunny government accounts.

"The image of the successful war in Chechnya from the very beginning was linked to Putin's campaign as prime minister and then with the rise in his popularity," said Alexei Simonov, head of the Glasnost Foundation.

Journalists from The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, Spain's El Pais and other news organizations were detained for 10 hours Dec. 29 after military officials said they had failed to get the necessary official permission.

The government has set up an information center in Moscow, where it offers NATO-style briefings and bombing footage. But one of the most successful operations is taking place on the ground, as a recent tour through Russian-occupied zones showed.

The only category of journalists who can travel with relative freedom in Chechnya are Chechens - but they have to hide their status as journalists from soldiers.

"Once my press card was found I barely escaped arrest," said one Chechen journalist who did not want to be identified. "It is also a problem to take a satellite phone there."

Russian journalists who are allowed by the Defense Ministry to go to Chechnya often fail to tell the Chechen version of events. Many of them remain at the government's press center in Mozdok, far from the combat.

Those who report from Grozny are limited to the area of a military unit and are accompanied by armed men if they leave the unit's area. In the last war, journalists often reported from Chechen-held territory - but rarely now, after the kidnappings of aid workers and journalists by Chechen armed bands.

For foreigners, getting the Defense Ministry accreditations to report freely from the war zone is extremely difficult. The detained reporters were told their Foreign Ministry accreditations were not enough, and that they had to have permission from local commanders as well.

Before the journalists were detained, the group passed through eight checkpoints with their Foreign Ministry accreditations. They were stopped at Staraya Sunzha near Grozny, said Rodrigo Fernandez, the El Pais correspondent. Although they were allowed to look around from that vantage point, they were ordered not to speak to local people. However, after a radioed message, audiocassettes and photographers' film were confiscated and the journalists were taken to Mozdok by helicopter, where they were told they had been in the area illegally. They were released after a warning that if they violated rules again, their Foreign Ministry accreditation would be canceled.

Subsequently, foreign journalists living at the hotel in Mozdok were told not to leave without a military escort.

"There are no rules here how and where we are supposed to get accreditation to go to Chechnya," said one of the journalists, who did not want to be named. "There are battles for Grozny. I have to understand what is going on there. I have to get there."

Andrei Babitsky, a Radio Liberty reporter, said that to get to Grozny he had to "walk 100 kilometers" to dodge soldiers' checkpoints. For his troubles, he was denounced by the government for his reporting.

The lack of corroborating evidence in the form of TV images has helped the government in its attempts to simply deny foreign reports of battlefield reverses. For instance, when Reuters and Associated Press journalists reported that over 100 soldiers were killed in Minutka Square in Grozny, Russian officials flatly rejected the reports as plants from Western spy agencies.

Likewise, the government has disputed reports based on refugee accounts of a massacre of 41 civilians by Russian troops at the village of Alkhan-Yurt.