I haven't been to the forest

The head of the Investigative Committee gave an interview to Izvestia, in which he accused Novaya Gazeta of lying in connection with a story about threats against its editor-in-chief Sergei Sokolov. In the meantime, it is known that on June 14 Bastrykin is scheduled to meet with the newspaper’s editor-in-chief Dmitry Muratov, who wrote him an open letter about these threats - Muratov confirmed that he was going to this meeting.

As you know, Bastrykin was offended by Sokolov’s publication on the unreasonably lenient sentence of Sergei Tsepovyaz, accused of involvement in murders and harboring a murderer in the village of Kushchevskaya. On June 4, Bastrykin invited Sokolov with him on a plane to Nalchik, where during the meeting he yelled at him and kicked him out of the room without accepting an apology. All leading publications wrote about this scandal, but what happened in the evening of the same day became known only after Muratov published an open letter. It says that when Bastrykin’s plane with Sokolov on board returned to Moscow, the security of the head of the Investigative Committee put the journalist in a car and took him to a wood near Moscow, where he was left alone with Bastrykin. Here Bastrykin had a tough conversation with Sokolov, during which he threatened his life, and also joked that he himself would investigate the case of his death. It should be noted that Muratov did not provide details of the conversation, but after the publication of the open letter, the president of the Glasnost Defense Foundation, Alexey Simonov, told RBC daily that, according to Sokolov, Bastrykin threatened to cut off the journalist’s head and chop off his legs.

Bastrykin himself stated that he had not been in the forest “I don’t even remember how many years.” He called the story about the conversation in the forest the delirium of an inflamed brain. He also noted that if threats are received, one must submit an application to law enforcement agencies, “and then there is silence for a whole week, some kind of separate negotiations with deputies, with the press service of the Investigative Committee.” Bastrykin only admitted that there was no need to show emotion, and, in his opinion, there was nothing to apologize to the publication for. He also noted that the scandal broke out after searches of the oppositionists.

On the way to the meeting, Muratov, in turn, called Bastrykin’s latest statement nonsense.

However, when the meeting did take place - at Interfax, in the presence of the chief editors of other publications - Bastrykin apologized to Muratov for the emotional breakdown that occurred at the meeting in Nalchik, and he accepted the apology. “For me, the agenda is exhausted. Reconciliation has taken place,” Muratov said, and they shook hands.

Bastrykin explained that he had a preliminary meeting with Muratov, where he “tried to explain his emotional state,” explaining the rudeness towards Sokolov by the fact that shortly before that, two employees of the Investigative Committee had died in Dagestan. Sokolov, in turn, apologized to Bastrykin over the phone (although in fact he had already apologized at that meeting in Nalchik) and now, according to Muratov, he can return to Russia. Bastrykin even gave Sokolov a watch (and apparently shed tears).

As for the threats in the forest, as Publicpost.Ru reports, Bastrykin admitted that he had a conversation with Sokolov at the side of the road, that the conversation was emotional, but supposedly ended normally. Muratov is apparently satisfied with this. However, some uncertainty remains, to put it mildly.