When the Sword Breaks the Pen

In journalism, the virtuous and persevering reporter is the golden standard by which all others in the profession are measured. But would that ideal hold up under a regime in which truth telling invites death threats, censorship, or murder?
In a new book called Murder Without Borders: Dying for the Story in the World’s Most Dangerous Places, award-winning investigative reporter Terry Gould analyses the stories of nine journalists who paid the ultimate price for their craft. Gould spent four years researching his subjects, in the process travelling to the five countries where journalists are most likely to be murdered on the job: the Philippines, Russia, Colombia, Bangladesh, and Iraq. The author asks not why these journalists were murdered, but the factor that led them to struggle in the face of certain death.
In an investigative tour de force, Gould brings a level of detail and realism to his descriptions of people and places that makes the book’s 400 pages melt away. The reporters he portrays resonate with human weakness; one Colombian journalist openly kept two separate households and entertained a string of mistresses on the side.
The story that is probably most familiar to Western readers is that of Anna Politkovskaya, the Russian journalist who was gunned down in 2006 in her apartment building. As she came out the elevator, a man with a baseball cap shot her in the heart, lungs, shoulder, and head. He left the murder weapon at her feet, a tell-tale sign of a contract hit.
Before her death, Politkovskaya infuriated Russian politicians and soldiers by covering the largely ignored Second Chechen War. She was a fierce critic of the Putin administration and flaunted the conventions of krysha (Russian for “roof”), “the nation’s metaphor for protection, influence, and impunity.” More krysha meant less fear of being punished for one’s crimes.
What most readers don’t know is that Politkovskaya was born in New York City to educated, upper-middle class diplomats. After a privileged childhood, she graduated from the University of Moscow’s journalism program at 18 and married two years later. Earlier in her career, Politkovskaya was known for her dramatic accounts of the lives of Moscow’s liberal elite.
It was only when she stumbled upon a hall filled with Chechen refugees at Civil Assistance that she had an epiphany. After that, Politkovskaya worked tirelessly for the refugees’ cause. Although she was always kind to the downtrodden, her co-workers at the Novaya Gazeta found her exhausting to work with. Despite being plagued by depression and censorship fears, Politkovskaya survived a poisoning attempt and weathered several death threats to expose what she viewed as a deep-seated injustice – a cause she defended with her life.
The other portraits in the book are equally engrossing. The untimely deaths of Politkovskaya et al. reaffirm the importance of keeping the truth safe from those would stamp it out. Murder Without Borders should be required reading for anyone who prizes democracy, journalist or not.

Murder Without Borders: Dying for the Story in the World’s Most Dangerous Places by Terry Gould (2009) will be available on April 28. It can be pre-ordered for $29.95 from Random House Canada’s website. For more information, visit www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl/9780679314707.html.

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