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Paul Klebnikov (russian: Павел Юрьевич Хлебников, translit=Pavel Yurievich Khlebnikov; June 3, 1963  – July 9, 2004) was an American journalist and historian of Russia. He worked for '' Forbes'' magazine for more than 10 years and at the time of his death was chief editor of the Russian edition of ''Forbes''. His murder in Moscow in 2004 was seen as a blow against investigative journalism in Russia. Three Chechens accused of taking part in the murder were acquitted. Though the murder appeared to be the work of assassins for hire, as of 2022, the alleged organizers of the murder had yet to be identified. According to another version, widely reported in Russian media, Klebnikov was killed by a close associate to the high-ranking member of linked both to Russian FSS service and Boris Berezovsky, a Russian oligarch.


Early life

Paul Klebnikov was born in New York to a family of Russian émigrés with a long military and political tradition: his great-great-great-grandfather Ivan Puschin participated in the Decembrist revolt in 1825 and was exiled to Siberia, and his great-grandfather, an admiral in the White Russian fleet, was assassinated by Bolsheviks. As a child, he was known as a daredevil including swimming during hurricanes. He attended
St. Bernard's School St. Bernard's School, founded in 1904 by John Card Jenkins,www.stbernards.org
- the school's website
and
Phillips Exeter Academy (not for oneself) la, Finis Origine Pendet (The End Depends Upon the Beginning) gr, Χάριτι Θεοῦ (By the Grace of God) , location = 20 Main Street , city = Exeter, New Hampshire , zipcode ...
, and graduated from the University of California, Berkeley with a BA in political science in 1984. He then enrolled in the Officer Candidates School of the US Marine Corps as a way to test himself, but upon completing the course, declined to take the offered commission. Instead, he pursued a PhD at the London School of Economics, where he would go on to win the Leonard Schapiro Prize "for excellence in Russian studies". Klebnikov wrote his doctoral thesis on agrarian reform in Russia following the Stolypin Reforms that sought to build an independent, progressive, and prosperous peasantry. His thesis was titled "Agricultural development in Russia, 1906-1917: Land reform, social agronomy and cooperation". From 1987–88, he lectured at the Institute of European Studies in London. On September 22, 1991, he married Helen "Musa" Train, the daughter of prominent
Wall Street Wall Street is an eight-block-long street in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It runs between Broadway in the west to South Street and the East River in the east. The term "Wall Street" has become a metonym for t ...
banker John Train. The couple would go on to have three children.


Reporting on Russia

Klebnikov joined ''Forbes'' in 1989 and gained a reputation for investigating murky post-Soviet business dealings and corruption. In 1996, he wrote a cover story for ''Forbes'' titled "Godfather of the Kremlin?" with the kicker 'Power. Politics. Murder. Boris Berezovsky could teach the guys in Sicily a thing or two.', comparing Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky to the
Sicilian mafia The Sicilian Mafia, also simply known as the Mafia and frequently referred to as Cosa nostra (, ; "our thing") by its members, is an Italian Mafia-terrorist-type organized crime syndicate and criminal society originating in the region of Sicily a ...
. The article was published without a byline, but was widely known to be Klebnikov's work. Klebnikov soon received death threats, and took a break from reporting in Russia to live with his family in Paris. Berezovsky subsequently sued ''Forbes'' for
libel Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defini ...
in a British court. Because the story had been published in an American magazine about a Russian citizen, the choice of venue was described by several authorities as libel tourism. Berezovsky won a partial retraction of the story in 2003. Meanwhile, Klebnikov expanded the article into the 2000 book ''Godfather of the Kremlin: Boris Berezovsky and the Looting of Russia''. A 2001 edition is entitled ''Godfather of the Kremlin: The Decline of Russia in the Age of Gangster Capitalism''. Believed to be based heavily on interviews with Alexander Korzhakov, the head of security for former president Boris Yeltsin, the book described the privatization process used by Yeltsin as "the robbery of the century" and detailed the alleged corruption of various Russian businesspeople, particularly focusing on Berezovsky. The book met with mixed reviews in journalistic circles. A review in '' The New York Times'' praised it as "richly detailed" and "effectively angry". Klebnikov released a second book, ''Conversation with a Barbarian: Interviews with a Chechen Field Commander on Banditry and Islam'', in 2003. The book is a transcript of a lengthy interview with Chechen rebel leader
Khozh-Ahmed Noukhayev Khozh-Ahmed Noukhayev (russian: Хож-Ахмет Нухаев; born November 11, 1954) also known as ''Khozha'' was a Chechen gangster and boss of the Chechen mafia known as Obshina in Moscow and a prominent figure in Chechen politics. His wher ...
, conducted in
Baku Baku (, ; az, Bakı ) is the capital and largest city of Azerbaijan, as well as the largest city on the Caspian Sea and of the Caucasus region. Baku is located below sea level, which makes it the lowest lying national capital in the world a ...
, Azerbaijan. In the course of the interview, Nukhayev gives his views on Islam and Chechen society. In the same year, Klebnikov was chosen to be the first editor of the Russian edition of ''Forbes''. Because his wife and children did not wish to move to Russia, Klebnikov agreed with them that he would take the post for only one year. The magazine only put out four issues before his death, including an article covering Russia's 100 wealthiest individuals, which some commentators speculate may have been the reason for his death.


Murder

On July 9, 2004, while leaving the ''Forbes'' office, Klebnikov was attacked on a Moscow street late at night by unknown assailants who fired at him from a slowly moving car. Klebnikov was shot four times and initially survived, but he died at the hospital after being transported in an ambulance that had no oxygen bottle and the hospital elevator that was taking him to the operating room broke down. Authorities described the attack as a contract killing. The publisher of the Russian edition of ''Forbes'' stated that the murder was "definitely linked" to Klebnikov's journalism. Various commentators have speculated that the magazine's recent story on Russia's 100 richest people may have triggered the attack; others suspect Berezovsky of being behind the murder.


Russian investigation

In 2006, prosecutors accused Chechen rebel leader Khozh-Ahmed Noukhayev, subject of Klebnikov's book ''A Conversation with a Barbarian'', of masterminding the attack. Three Chechen men—Kazbek Dukuzov, Musa Vakhayev, and Fail Sadretdinov—were arrested and tried in a closed trial for the murder, but all three were acquitted. Sadretdinov was later convicted on unrelated charges and sentenced to nine years' imprisonment, while Vakhayev and Dukuzov had their acquittals overturned by the
Supreme Court of Russia The Supreme Court of the Russian Federation (russian: links=no, Верховный суд Российской Федерации, Verkhovny sud Rossiyskoy Federatsii) is a court within the judiciary of Russia and the court of last resort in ...
, allowing them to be re-prosecuted. In July 2007, on the third anniversary of the murder, the U.S. Department of State protested the continuing failure of the Russian government to find the perpetrators, calling for further investigation. U.S. President George W. Bush also appealed directly to Russian President Vladimir Putin for action. Vakhayev and Dukuzov were scheduled to be retried in 2007, again in a closed trial, but could not be located. On December 17, the trial was postponed again because of Dukuzov's continued absence. The process then "quietly stalled". In July 2009, Russian authorities agreed to reopen the suspended investigation into the killings. They also stated that they no longer believed Nukhayev had masterminded the murder (though they continued to believe he played some role in the attack).


Legacy

In 2004, the Committee to Protect Journalists posthumously named Klebnikov one of four winners of the CPJ International Press Freedom Awards. An organization named the Paul Klebnikov Fund was established in his memory to award an annual courage prize to journalists as well as granting internships to young Russian journalists to work in Western media. Klebnikov's Exeter classmates endowed an annual Klebnikov Lecture to honor his memory. The first Klebnikov Lecture was held on May 12, 2006, at the 25th reunion of Klebnikov's Exeter class (1981), and featured remarks by '' The Wall Street Journal'' correspondent and Exeter alumnus Jon Karp.


Project Klebnikov

Project Klebnikov is a global alliance specifically devoted to developing new information on the Klebnikov murder and to furthering some of the investigative work Klebnikov began. The organization was founded in July 2005, and includes over 20 journalists and partner media companies. The organization has an international representation of investigative journalists, including individuals from '' Vanity Fair'', ''
60 Minutes ''60 Minutes'' is an American television news magazine broadcast on the CBS television network. Debuting in 1968, the program was created by Don Hewitt and Bill Leonard, who chose to set it apart from other news programs by using a unique styl ...
'', New York University's department of journalism, '' The Economist'', Bloomberg News and ''Forbes''. It was launched by eight journalists from Bloomberg, ''Vanity Fair'' and ''Forbes'' on July 9, 2005, the anniversary of Klebnikov's murder. Journalist Richard Behar serves as the organization's director.


Books

*


See also

* Georgiy Gongadze * Dmitry Kholodov * Vladislav Listyev * Anna Politkovskaya * List of unsolved murders


References


External links

*
Paul Klebnikov speaks about Russian and American rich people
Video from YouTube
The Paul Klebnikov Fund

Project Klebnikov


by Paul Klebnikov

* ttp://en.ria.ru/world/20140709/190869098/Kerry-Marks-Anniversary-of-Klebnikov-Killing-with-Call-for.html RIA Novosti: Kerry Marks Anniversary of Klebnikov Killing with Call for Russian Probe {{DEFAULTSORT:Klebnikov, Paul 1963 births 2004 deaths 2004 murders in Russia Forbes people Alumni of the London School of Economics American expatriates in Russia American magazine editors American male non-fiction writers American people of Russian descent American political writers Assassinated American journalists Deaths by firearm in Russia Journalists killed in Russia Male murder victims People murdered by Russian-speaking organized crime People murdered in Moscow Phillips Exeter Academy alumni University of California, Berkeley alumni Unsolved murders in Russia Works about organized crime in Russia Writers from New York City 20th-century American male writers