The most terrible thing was that I would just disappear. It would be impossible to find out who killed me, and they could blame the rebels. Ms. Politkovskaya was investigating the cases of 90 families from Chechnya's Vedeno district, who had begged for help in escaping brutalities at the hands of Russian troops. Minutes after leaving, she was arrested. Interrogators questioned her for hours, threatened to harm her two grown children, and told her to take off her clothes - which she refused.
Colonels are like gods on earth in the villages where they are deployed.
Since December, he said, federal authorities have doubled the number of criminal cases they are pursuing against soldiers.