For outstanding reporting by a Russian journalist who displays courage, insight, and independence of thought
During the Soviet war in Afghanistan, Major Izmailov commanded a battalion. Now a reporter for one of Russia’s last bastions of the free press, the Moscow newspaper, Novaya Gazeta, Izmailov has written an authoritative column on Russian military affairs. No mere commentator, Izmailov, a longtime colleague of the late Anna Politkovskaya, is part independent analyst, part human rights mediator, and at least two parts muckraker in the tradition of Seymour Hersh. His 2006 columns typify the Izmailov style: each is an unflinching examination of malfeasance in the armed forces, be it corruption at the highest levels, hazing of recruits, or alleged war crimes in the ongoing conflict, now in its thirteenth year, in Chechnya.
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