Andrei Babitskii
Chechen police detained him, and US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright expressed strong concern over him being detained as a possible enemy collaborator.
She had no qualms, however, about insurgents treating him as one of their own, when they exchanged their friend for three Russian soldiers.The story of the exchange is very murky to this day (as most stories involving Babitsky): either he wasn’t exchanged at all, or he was, but not by the people which he thought exchanged him… Whatever it was, soon after he was arrested with a forged passport in Makhachkala, immediately went on a hunger strike, was rapidly released on bail, taken to Moscow by the police minister’s plane, and ultimately got off with a fine.
At the press conference in the capital Babitsky said that Putin was personally involved in his case, and the goal was to chase Babitsky out of the country at all costs.In 2003 he was witness for the defense at the trial on Ahmed Zakayev’s extradition.In September 2004 – after the news of the hostage-taking in Beslan – he tried to fly to Ossetia to mediate for their release, but was detained at Vnukovo airport.
In August 2008 Babitsky sharply condemned “Russian aggression” in Georgia and by November 2009, he headed the “Echo of the Caucasus” – Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty service broadcasting for in Georgia, Abkhazia and South Ossetia [RFE/RL itself is a Cold War era, CIA founded/funded US mouthpiece in East Europe]
In March 2014, Babitsky unexpectedly supported the reunification of Crimea with Russia in his personal blog (while simultaneously condemning Putin’s treatment of dissidents).
Because of this he was temporarily suspended from working at RFE/RL; however, his materials eventually reappeared on air in “Echo of the Caucasus”.
But – apparently – “Radio Liberty” has very little patience for free thought.
In September 2014 Babitsky was fired, but he only recently elaborated on the reasons, in an interview to a Prague newspaper “Lidove noviny”.
http://bbgwatch.com/bbgwatch/rferl-star-andrei-babitsky-claims-he-was-fired-in-2014-for-his-views/
According to Babitsky, he happened to shoot a video where locals in the Donbass are exhuming four bodies – two civilians and two rebels. However, the locals were convinced that the dead were not rebels at all.
“They were killed by pro-government paramilitary fighters from the “Aidar” battalion… I posted the video without comment and sent it to the Moldovan editorial office of “Radio Liberty”. After material was placed on the site, pro-Kiev nationalists from Ukrainian RFE office had a massive fit… There was a terrible scandal … But the video I posted – that was only what I really saw with my own eyes… ”
Finding this video today it is impossible; it was removed from the “Radio Liberty” website and somehow purged even from YouTube.
…
So, ultimately, Babitsky’s struggle for freedom was put to an end by “Radio Liberty”.
A fitting outcome, don’t you think?
Source: http://yudenich.ru/content/konec-svobody-andreya-babickogo
The zionazis tolerate no dissent they cannot totally control.
On the one hand I have no sympathy for him at all.And on the other hand the two times he actually stood up for what was right, the West (who lionized him when his reports were anti-Russian) crushed him for it.Total irony there.Maybe for all his Russophobia,and support of Chechen terrorism.Supporting nazis was just one bridge too far for him.
Probably dressing him up for another covert mission.
I’d trust him as far as I could throw him.
Andrei Babitskii – some “freedom champion”… What a despicable creep… Where is СМЕРШ when it is really needed…
mod: СМЕРШ = SMERSH
He expressed his views and probably thought it was his right and his duty. Whether or not one agrees with his opinions, there is no need, or benefit, to go after him, especially right now.
–But it shows what RFE/RL really is (if that was not obvious).
@ Mike,
Q; Whether or not one agrees with his opinions…
R: I concur. Tolerance is a yardstick of human compassion and/or understanding. As I’ve always been the ‘other,’ the ‘immigrant,’ or the ‘foreigner’ myself for most of my life and literally saw a bunch 0f little kids run away screaming their respective heads off, because they’d never seen a white guy up close before, I think I know a little bit about the acceptance [or not] of being not your run-of-the-mill, great guy living next door, kinda dude.
Live and let live, is my motto, but I also try to come to grasps with why I don’t kill anything. Yes, I do eat eggs, but never a chicken…
Yet another pawn removed from the board; and there are innumerable pawns wanting to take its place.
The May 2014 Senate Hearing featuring Nuland excusing the events of Maidan also has a senior US official telling her to up the anti Russian propaganda, and he explicitly mentions RFE/RL. They don’t even bother to hide it now.
Dear The Saker,
What goes around comes around. You sow what you reap. You lie with dogs you get fleas. Just few phrases which are appropriate.
Rgds,
Veritas
Whoops just seen my typo – I meant “You reap what you sow” – doh. :)
Veritas
What this shows is what the US understands by freedom of speech. So even an outspoken allied has to keep an unbroken slave thought, if he diverges just an inch, he is kicked off, or worse.
We live in wonderland, really.
Well, I guess he couldn’t paint the reunification of Crimea as some sorted, nefarious affair without loosing credibilty with his base, without looking like a total US/NATO stooge.
With the exhumation, he had to give account to the testimony of the people of the regions being attacked by Kiev junta–or he would loose cred with his base.
The empires designs and strategies functioned at cross purposes with his longterm prospects, given the reson d’être that undergirds his core ethos.
He wasn’t intelligent enough to realize this going in to the job as radio propagandist for the west–he sided with bad actors, the malcontents that seek to stop Russia from rising as a counter to the unipolar empire.
From the empires logic, this man, like the people of the Donbass, are expendable.
Same impetus for making bad decisions that has afflicted many of the Bandarites from western Ukraine.