Another Russian Journalist Killed

Ivan Safronov, the military affairs writer for Kommersant, fell off of the fifth floor window in a stairwell in his apartment building. Suicide appears the most likely case according to the authorities. His comrades in the media believe this scenario is not the case, since he has been known to be a "strong, cheerful person who would be extremely unlikely to kill himself."

Prior to becoming a journalist, Safronov was a colonel in the Russian Space Forces. As a journalist with Kommersant, he wrote many critical pieces regarding the military and had been frequently questioned by the FSB, which accused him of divulging state secrets. Charges were never filed against him because his sources were public sources. Last December, he angered state authorities when he reported on the third consecutive failed launch of its new Bulava intercontinental ballistic missile. The government never admitted its failure. - Houston Chronicle

Just day or two before, an expert on Russian intelligence, Paul Joyal, was shot during a random robbery in Washington. Joyal just a few days ago was interviewed by NBC Dateline, regarding the poisoning of former FSB agent Alexander Litvinenko in London. Litvinenko, a President Putin critic accused Putin being behind his poisoning shortly before he died in November. -USA Today

If you scroll down I may have a posting on the Litvinenko poisoning, and I also have a posting from October about the murder of Kremlin critic and journalist Anna Politkovskaya.