Text of Acceptance Speech of Alexei Simonov, Winner of WPFC Award
This week, the World Press Freedom Committee awarded its second Dana Bullen Press Freedom Advocacy Prize to Alexei Simonov of the Glasnost Defense Foundation of Moscow, at the National Press Club of Washington, USA.
Simonov was cited for his extraordinary courage and determination fighting for freedom of expression and of the press in a country where more than 200 journalists have been killed since 1993.
Simonov, who was introduced by WPFC's European Representative Ronald Koven, accepted the award via a recorded video from Moscow. This is the text of his remarks:
Simonov was cited for his extraordinary courage and determination fighting for freedom of expression and of the press in a country where more than 200 journalists have been killed since 1993.
Simonov, who was introduced by WPFC's European Representative Ronald Koven, accepted the award via a recorded video from Moscow. This is the text of his remarks:
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I am honored and happy to receive this award from World Press Freedom Committee for the Glasnost Foundation - you're our first American partner in our 18-year history. Let me explain to you why the name of our foundation includes the word “Glasnost” and in what way it differs from freedom of expression.
As we see, freedom of expression consists of two elements: the opportunity to tell the truth and the opportunity to be heard. When starting, we understood that the first element was a realistic, although difficult, thing to do, whereas making sure we were heard depended on the political climate in the country. So, we wanted to defend what we considered realistic. Our original slogan was borrowed from the fairy tale, “The Emperor's New Clothes” by Hans Christian Anderson. “Glasnost is the opportunity to cry out in front of the crowd that the emperor is naked, whereas freedom of expression is the opportunity to tell the emperor about the nakedness prior to the setting out of the procession through the city.“
We lived with this slogan for nearly a decade before we started to notice that the voices calling out from the crowd were not always sincere, or they had simply been hired by a rival dynasty to work against the emperor in the interests of other kings. So, we chose a new slogan: “Glasnost is a turtle crawling toward freedom of expression, which sounds unhurried and wise and most importantly, it goes ahead because the turtle cannot crawl back.” We have lived with this slogan ever since.
When we were just beginning, it seems our flag was waving over a freedom-thirsty territory as vast as a continent. Now that years have passed, we can see that the continent has shrunk to the size of an island, and continues shrinking. But even if it is only an island, it can still be a shelter from a roaring storm, and a harbor where you can patch your sails and mend the holes in your boats. And the flag of freedom of expression still waves over this island. We have lost many friends and comrades-in-arms between 1993 and 2009; over 200 journalists were killed in Russia, including your compatriots —Cynthia Elbaum, Andrew Shumeck, Paul Klebnikov. They gave their lives for freedom of expression in my country. So may I ask you, regardless of this festive occasion, to stand up in a minute of silence, to pay tribute to all of our murdered colleagues.
(A moment of silence is observed.)
Thank you. Just think, if we were to devote a minute of silence to the memory of each of those victims, we would stand in silence for three and a half hours. And only eight per cent of those crimes have been duly investigated, and in only three cases, not only the direct killers, but also the masterminds, have been identified.
Impunity is the No. 1 social evil in Russia. And journalists, as well as businessmen, make up the majority of the list of victims of the last 10 years. We all, the International Federation of Journalists, the Glasnost Defense Foundation, the American Committee to Protect Journalists, have undertaken independent and thorough investigations into those deaths, yielding different results, but coming to similar conclusions: Russia does not care much about the voices of truth -- gagged one after another on its territory.
If you ask me how we live today, I will tell you we have not confined our efforts to putting together this endless martyrology. On a monthly basis, we publish reports of violations of journalists' rights, such as threats against and beatings of journalists, attacks on media offices, seizure of TV networks, and countless legal charges brought against reporters. Our data of such violations, by far not exhaustive, totals an average of 1,500 a year. In this kind of situation, can we help many of those in need of our urgent legal assistance? Not many, I'm afraid. Fortunately, over the past few years, Russia has seen the establishment of a few organizations whose line of activity is akin to ours. It was a part of our work, too.
We continue to teach and train journalists. Over the past year alone, the Glasnost Defense Foundation, separately and in cooperation with the US Journalist Training Center, has organized eight schools for journalists in Moscow, Yekaterinburg, Petrosavodsk, Vladivostok. What do we teach? And whom do we teach? Budding reporters to conduct independent investigations, civil journalism to bloggers, veteran journalists to write about jury trials.
Russia is a vast country and our annually updated map shows that there is no real press freedom in any region throughout the Russian Federation. Judging by the latest edition of the map, 45 regions - that is in half of Russia - have press freedom characteristics that are barely visible. In 17 others, they are not visible at all. Freedom of expression being [restricted] stopped the goal of Russia's progress toward democracy. Regrettably, this is a fact that has not ... been acknowledged by the Russian authorities, but also by many international organizations.
Long-term partners and sponsors that used to support our efforts have been leaving Russia, and not only as a result of the current crisis. They have done so because they have been losing hope. But we have no right to lose hope. As long as [the newspaper] New Times continues to be released, as long as the Voice of the Moscow ad hoc radio station is heard over my country, and as long as newspapers and magazines opposed to the loss of freedom of speech continue to be issued, there is something we can still hope for. And the Glasnost Defense Foundation is one of the few organizations continuing to defend our right to hope. This is the cornerstone principle of our work.
Thank you for your attention.
I am honored and happy to receive this award from World Press Freedom Committee for the Glasnost Foundation - you're our first American partner in our 18-year history. Let me explain to you why the name of our foundation includes the word “Glasnost” and in what way it differs from freedom of expression.
As we see, freedom of expression consists of two elements: the opportunity to tell the truth and the opportunity to be heard. When starting, we understood that the first element was a realistic, although difficult, thing to do, whereas making sure we were heard depended on the political climate in the country. So, we wanted to defend what we considered realistic. Our original slogan was borrowed from the fairy tale, “The Emperor's New Clothes” by Hans Christian Anderson. “Glasnost is the opportunity to cry out in front of the crowd that the emperor is naked, whereas freedom of expression is the opportunity to tell the emperor about the nakedness prior to the setting out of the procession through the city.“
We lived with this slogan for nearly a decade before we started to notice that the voices calling out from the crowd were not always sincere, or they had simply been hired by a rival dynasty to work against the emperor in the interests of other kings. So, we chose a new slogan: “Glasnost is a turtle crawling toward freedom of expression, which sounds unhurried and wise and most importantly, it goes ahead because the turtle cannot crawl back.” We have lived with this slogan ever since.
When we were just beginning, it seems our flag was waving over a freedom-thirsty territory as vast as a continent. Now that years have passed, we can see that the continent has shrunk to the size of an island, and continues shrinking. But even if it is only an island, it can still be a shelter from a roaring storm, and a harbor where you can patch your sails and mend the holes in your boats. And the flag of freedom of expression still waves over this island. We have lost many friends and comrades-in-arms between 1993 and 2009; over 200 journalists were killed in Russia, including your compatriots —Cynthia Elbaum, Andrew Shumeck, Paul Klebnikov. They gave their lives for freedom of expression in my country. So may I ask you, regardless of this festive occasion, to stand up in a minute of silence, to pay tribute to all of our murdered colleagues.
(A moment of silence is observed.)
Thank you. Just think, if we were to devote a minute of silence to the memory of each of those victims, we would stand in silence for three and a half hours. And only eight per cent of those crimes have been duly investigated, and in only three cases, not only the direct killers, but also the masterminds, have been identified.
Impunity is the No. 1 social evil in Russia. And journalists, as well as businessmen, make up the majority of the list of victims of the last 10 years. We all, the International Federation of Journalists, the Glasnost Defense Foundation, the American Committee to Protect Journalists, have undertaken independent and thorough investigations into those deaths, yielding different results, but coming to similar conclusions: Russia does not care much about the voices of truth -- gagged one after another on its territory.
If you ask me how we live today, I will tell you we have not confined our efforts to putting together this endless martyrology. On a monthly basis, we publish reports of violations of journalists' rights, such as threats against and beatings of journalists, attacks on media offices, seizure of TV networks, and countless legal charges brought against reporters. Our data of such violations, by far not exhaustive, totals an average of 1,500 a year. In this kind of situation, can we help many of those in need of our urgent legal assistance? Not many, I'm afraid. Fortunately, over the past few years, Russia has seen the establishment of a few organizations whose line of activity is akin to ours. It was a part of our work, too.
We continue to teach and train journalists. Over the past year alone, the Glasnost Defense Foundation, separately and in cooperation with the US Journalist Training Center, has organized eight schools for journalists in Moscow, Yekaterinburg, Petrosavodsk, Vladivostok. What do we teach? And whom do we teach? Budding reporters to conduct independent investigations, civil journalism to bloggers, veteran journalists to write about jury trials.
Russia is a vast country and our annually updated map shows that there is no real press freedom in any region throughout the Russian Federation. Judging by the latest edition of the map, 45 regions - that is in half of Russia - have press freedom characteristics that are barely visible. In 17 others, they are not visible at all. Freedom of expression being [restricted] stopped the goal of Russia's progress toward democracy. Regrettably, this is a fact that has not ... been acknowledged by the Russian authorities, but also by many international organizations.
Long-term partners and sponsors that used to support our efforts have been leaving Russia, and not only as a result of the current crisis. They have done so because they have been losing hope. But we have no right to lose hope. As long as [the newspaper] New Times continues to be released, as long as the Voice of the Moscow ad hoc radio station is heard over my country, and as long as newspapers and magazines opposed to the loss of freedom of speech continue to be issued, there is something we can still hope for. And the Glasnost Defense Foundation is one of the few organizations continuing to defend our right to hope. This is the cornerstone principle of our work.
Thank you for your attention.
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