Reconciliation with Bastrykin. Journalists are unhappy

Chairman of the Investigative Committee Alexander Bastrykin met with editors of Moscow publications. The outcome of the meeting—reconciliation between Bastrykin and Novaya Gazeta editor-in-chief Dmitry Muratov—caused a whole stream of comments. It turned out that the peaceful outcome of the scandal with the author of Novaya, Sergei Sokolov, offended most of the journalistic community. Only a few decided that Dmitry Muratov, who shook hands with Bastrykin, deserves understanding.

Editor-in-chief of the magazine "Around the World" Masha Gessen:

In general, this is the result of the day. Sergei Sokolov can no longer be taken into the forest and threatened with violence. But all other journalists are allowed. Because from today this is no longer a criminal or official crime, but something like everyday rudeness. This is a gift presented by Dmitry Muratov to the journalistic workshop, which yesterday stood on pickets for him.

Special correspondent of Kommersant Publishing House Olga Allenova:

Leave Muratov alone, he is at war, and like a good commander he is trying to save the lives of his soldiers. And sacrificing them for the sake of the principle of inevitability of punishment is an inappropriate luxury in our days. And there will be no punishment anyway. Only one victim.


Radio Liberty journalist Mikhail Sokolov:

Alexander Bastrykin: “I would like to start by offering Dmitry Andreevich (Muratov) an apology for the emotional breakdown that I had at the meeting.” “For me, the agenda has been exhausted. Reconciliation has taken place,” Muratov said at the meeting. “Thank you.” “Thank you for your understanding,” they said to each other and publicly shook hands.

Exhausted? Was there no forest? Threats too? And shook your hand?
If everything is so simple (emotional breakdown - bypasses the Criminal Code), I will draw a conclusion. More at the suggestion of the editor-in-chief. I don’t sign “new” letters of support. Let him kiss Putin's freaks and not complain.

Presenter at the radio station "Echo of Moscow" Olga Bychkova:

I don’t feel in any way offended by today’s ending to the story with Bastrykin and Novaya Gazeta.

Firstly, I completely trust Muratov. When he described this hell with Sergei Sokolov, I had no doubt that everything was true. And in the same way, now I have no reason to doubt what Dima is doing. Bastrykin made apologies and justifications, Muratov is satisfied with them. OK.

Secondly, my attitude towards threats against journalists and the self-confidence of bosses does not change - no matter what happens next. I don't think anyone "used" me yesterday. I tried to express my own attitude towards ugliness. And I don’t regret it at all.

Deputy editor-in-chief of Echo of Moscow Vladimir Varfolomeev ‏@Varfolomeev:

One of the posters, for which we were put in a paddy wagon the day before yesterday, looked like this: “Bystrykin, hands off Novaya Gazeta.” Today, reading and listening to some comments, it’s time to draw it again, replacing only one word: “Colleagues, hands off "Novaya Gazeta". Friends, are you completely crazy?!

Echo of Moscow journalist Sergei Buntman:

What will happen next? Not a forest, but a field, not TFR, but someone else? Does this public reconciliation guarantee the safety of journalists, activists, and all other citizens? Family. We won't call the police. Yes, the fact of the matter is that this nervous comrade is not a husband, not a brother, or a neighbor. He is the same police. He is the state, which, unlike citizens not vested with power, is not supposed to be nervous at all. Why does the explanation of a state law enforcement officer of the highest rank: “I lost it” convince society, even arouse sympathy, but no one will ever accept such an explanation of the girl who threw asphalt at an armored knight of order? <...>

Echo of Moscow journalist Alina Grebneva:

Thus, Bastrykin admitted that he took the journalist to the forest. Oh-fi-get! And no one will do anything about it. Welcome to Russia!

Editor-in-Chief of the Russian News Service Sergei Dorenko:

Muratov and Bastrykin got along quietly. Those who harnessed themselves to “Novaya” feel that we were defending a hysterical woman from her husband with stakes, and we are fools. They have love.

Dmitry Butrin , head of the economic policy department at Kommersant:

(no offense to anyone, it will be said and read)
Let's be cynical, let's take due credit:
1. Novaya Gazeta did not support the general wishes for the continuation of the scandal with Bastrykin, although it had the opportunity to support the opposition’s cause by doing so - by increasing its own risks of an unknown nature.
2. The opposition does not hide its disappointment, but does not directly blame NG for this.
3. The head of the Investigative Committee demonstrated his unwillingness to escalate the conflict at any cost, although the day before everything indicated that this would be the case. His head, apparently, too - the interview with Izvestia was prepared yesterday, something has changed since then, most likely, the head of the Investigative Committee had calls from the Kremlin, after which he changed his mood.
4. The actual circumstances of the case are unknown, and all parties except NG and SK will accept this. Nobody really wants to know how much truth there is in a matter and how much is exaggeration: it could turn out awkward.

In general, we have all become better at thinking and counting.

Some will like it, some will not, but no one is ready for a very acute conflict yet - although it was expected. I don't know if this is all good or bad. Very contradictory. It happens when in the end it’s “a little good and a little bad”, but here it’s “very good and very bad”, which gives a very high risk of overvaluation for new entrants. “We’ll remember later,” everyone is sure, and they don’t believe each other.

I don’t like it when it’s like this, but “civilized politics” is almost always like this, what to do. It is gratifying that this is a “civilized policy”. It is unclear how much of this is an accident. Perhaps we are all on the verge of collapse. There is no reason to believe that the movement towards this brink does not continue.

Correspondent of the radio station "Echo of Moscow" Inessa Zemler:

You know what, you are the ones who demand that I brand Muratov with disgrace right now? In your family, was one of your children killed every year? I sincerely hope not - and I hope that you will never, hear, NEVER find out what it is. And if bending, shaking hands - call it what you want - is the only way to save a person’s LIFE, then I myself will bend and kiss hands and feet. If you are unable to understand this simple axiom, please unsubscribe. If there is something more important to you than life - and not yours personally, but the person for whom you are responsible, then you and I are not on the same path.

State Duma deputy, member of the United Russia faction, former employee of Moskovsky Komsomolets Alexander Khinshtein ‏@Khinshtein:

In this regard, I remember an anecdote: “Rabinovich, they say you were beaten at the station yesterday?” - “What a station! So-so, a small stop.”

TV critic Irina Petrovskaya:

She was silent all day because, like many, she was at a loss. I read what my friends wrote, thought, and suffered. Now, in the night, without knowing the details and details, I came to the conclusion: if Dima did this, then it was impossible in any other way. And for sure: Dima is one of the most honest and pure people I have ever met in my life. And I won’t throw stones at him only because there are a large number of people who want to do this. And he is my friend first and foremost. And lastly, the editor-in-chief. There have been plenty of editors-in-chief in my life—only a few friends among them.

Blogger, press secretary of Ilya Ponomarev Danila Lindele‏@dlindele:

Why the hell did Muratov and Bastrykin make peace? You can't forgive something like that. Okay. I hope that Bastrykin managed to clear his phone data.

Businessman Alexander Lebedev:

I have no doubt about the version of what happened that is presented by Novaya. There are simply no grounds for “provocations”, and the newspaper has never dealt with them. S. Sokolov is a discreet, honest and professional person. It was he who worked with the Investigative Committee all these years in the case of Anya Politkovskaya, and the parties have nothing to reproach each other with <...>

Echo of Moscow journalist Timur Olevsky:

Did Peskov apologize for “liver on asphalt”? Hugged with the arrested?

Journalist, former editor-in-chief of the magazine "Russian Life" Dmitry Olshansky:

The lesson taught by Ivan Ivanovich Muratov and Ivan Nikiforovich Bastrykin to the liberal intelligentsia is very simple: you cannot be such fantastically naive fools.

Journalist Evgeniy Levkovich :

Of course, I didn’t lose any of my friends or acquaintances in such a terrible way: to be riddled with bullets in the elevator of my own entrance, like Anna Politkovskaya, or beaten to death, it seems, with a hammer, like Igor Domnikov, or shot in broad daylight in the very center of Moscow , like Stanislav Markelov and Anastasia Baburova. I was seriously threatened only once in my life - I never received threats on a daily basis, as many Novaya employees receive, so I just don’t know how to live with this and what compromises can be made in order not to experience this , so as not to torment their families and keep them safe. Therefore, I will never condemn Novaya Gazeta for making peace with Bastrykin; I have no moral right, especially since Dmitry Muratov personally did not promise me anything, and we were not sitting in the same trench.

Without judging, I’ll just say what I have the right to talk about. Now several of my acquaintances and friends are facing criminal cases that are unprecedented in their lawlessness. Some of them - with whom I stood on Bolotnaya Square, on pickets near the Tverskoy and Presnensky courts, and visited all possible police departments - are already in prison. And I can’t even imagine how hard it is for them and their families. Others are under investigation and live in constant fear. At any moment I myself could find myself involved in any of these criminal cases. All searches, raids and detentions were personally authorized by Mr. Bastrykin. I remember this every minute - simply because I remember about my friends.

And one more thing. Anna Stepanovna Politkovskaya, if she were alive today, would never shake hands with a person like Bastrykin. I also have the right to talk about this: my family knew Anna Stepanovna well. My mother studied music with her daughter.

And to judge... Only time and God will judge us.