Unusual U.S.-Russian Reporting Team To Probe Editor's Murder in MoscowSubmitted by editor
on August 16, 2005 - 2:15pm.
By JACOB GERSHMAN As an American journalist working in Moscow, Paul Klebnikov, accumulated a lengthy list of enemies, ranging from Chechen mobsters to billionaire bandits. Those responsible for his murder last year may not have realized just how many allies Klebnikov also had. A team of top-flight investigative reporters from America and Russia has committed itself to untangling the case of Klebnikov, the 41-year-old editor of Forbes Russia who was gunned down at the peak of his career while walking home from his offices in northeastern Moscow on the evening of July 9. Dubbed Project Klebnikov, it's a cooperative mission that involves at least 20 journalists, New York University's department of journalism, the Economist, Bloomberg News, Vanity Fair, and Forbes. This sort of synergy in the field is "pretty much unheard of" the dean of Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism, Nicholas Lemann, said. The notion of collaboration works against the instincts of those in the business: News outlets need exclusives and reporters typically don't like to part with sources or glory. Members of Project Klebnikov, a voluntary effort, say they are driven by a lack of confidence in both Russia's investigation into the murder and the ability of a single news organization to crack the case alone. They point to a statistic that reflects the insecurity with which reporters in Russia operate and the state of the country's legal system: Of the 12 contract-style murders of journalists in Russia since President Putin became president in 2000, none has been solved. Klebnikov is the only American among them. Among their biggest supporters are Klebnikov's family members, who recently were given access to evidence in the case from the office of Russia's prosecutor general. Paul's elder brother, Michael Klebnikov, 50, in a telephone interview with The New York Sun, said he was skeptical of the results of Russia's investigation, which pins his brother's murder on a Chechen mafia leader, Khozh-Akhmed Nukhayev, who was critically profiled by Klebnikov in a 2003 book called "Conversations With a Barbarian." Michael Klebnikov said he doubts that Mr. Nukhayev had such a violent reaction to the book and speculated that the motive for the murder had to do with documents that his murdered brother had in his possession. On two separate occasions, in March and May 2004, his brother told family members about "deeply troubling" documents he had found, one batch of which related to Moscow real estate. "This was a pre-emptive move rather than retribution," the elder brother told the Sun. "But this is purely speculation." The family has hired an attorney to review the evidence in Moscow and is also getting advice from the American government, which established a multi-agency working group "to look at all aspects of the case," the assistant secretary of state for European affairs, Daniel Fried, told the Sun by telephone yesterday. The size and scope of Project Klebnikov has observers likening it to the most famous of journalist cooperatives, the Arizona Project of 1976. Led by Bob Greene of Newsday, 38 reporters from 28 newspapers and television stations descended on the Copper State to finish the work of slain investigative reporter Don Bolles, who had been working on a story about land fraud when a car bomb took his life. The Arizona Project, the focus of which was exposing corruption and organized crime in Arizona rather than who was behind Bolles's death, resulted in a 23-part series that ran in several major metropolitan newspapers, including Newsday. The coordinator of Project Klebnikov is Richard Behar, who met Klebnikov in the late 1980s when the two were early in their careers and working for Forbes magazine. Mr. Behar is best known for his lengthy expose of Scientology that appeared in Time magazine in 1991. That story led the church to launch a $416 million libel lawsuit against the magazine, which was dismissed by a federal appeals court in 2001. He was reporting from Karachi in 2001 for Fortune magazine - following the same terrorism-financing trail that led Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl to his death. Mr. Behar said the idea of the project goes back to an October memorial service for Klebnikov on the Upper East Side, during which he told mourners that he and other journalists ought to figure out who murdered their colleague. In a recent interview at Soho House in the meatpacking district, Mr. Behar said he doubted that one news outlet could unravel the case. "With all respect to news organizations, a story like this in today's economic and global climate is too complex, cumbersome, expensive, and risky to commit the resources to try to entangle," he said. Mr. Behar said the project is following five threads. He told the Sun he recently came across "a very hot lead" and that "the alliance will be jumping on it immediately," but he would not provide specifics. Two other possible threads involve an exiled Russian oligarch, Boris Berezovsky, who accumulated billions of dollars selling cars and oil. Mr. Berezovsky, who lives in Britain, sued Forbes for running an article that Klebnikov wrote implicating the tycoon in the murder of an employee of a TV station he owned. Klebnikov wrote a 2000 book about Mr. Berezovsky titled "Godfather of the Kremlin." The other major theory proposes that Klebnikov was targeted by one of the tycoons featured in a list of the country's billionaires that was published by Forbes Russia. Mr. Behar describes Project Klebnikov as a "carefully constructed" "virtual bureau." There is no overarching funding for the project, he said, and members commit as much time as they want to. They are not required to share all of their leads on the case but are encouraged to submit new information to a confidential database, which they can access via the Internet. Membership, which he said would eventually grow to 40 people by late fall, is by invitation only, and includes a number of people who are remaining anonymous. The role of the news organizations that have expressed support for the project has yet to be determined, Mr. Behar said. Richard Stern of Stern and Company has agreed to handle publicity on a pro bono basis. The founder and director of NYU's Business and Economic Reporting Program, Stephen Solomon, said some of his students will be available to provide research assistance. The announcement of the project in July came one month after the prosecutor general's office in Russia said it had completed its investigation into Klebnikov's death and blamed it on Chechen warlord and gangster Mr. Nukhayev and the contract killers he allegedly hired. Russia says it has two suspects in custody - Kazbek Dukuzov and Musa Vakhaev - and is in pursuit of three more, including Mr. Nukhayev, who has been missing for some time and is rumored to have died. No trial date has been set, Mr. Behar said. Complete archives at http://www.sitbot.net/ Please let us stay on topic and be civil. OM
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