Nothing Out of Place
Killed past Saturday, a prominent reporter Anna Politkovskaya was buried yesterday in Troekurovskoe Cemetery in Moscow. A small hall of the last respect hadn’t enough room to accommodate every mourner. No officials that could be directly or indirectly responsible for the crime were spotted in the crowd lining up for more than three hours outside the premises.
The civil mourning service was slated to begin at 2:00 p.m., MSK. But a crowd of over 500 gathered in front of the premises already by 1:30 p.m. Reporters, mostly the foreign reporters, were eager to interview their famous counterparts and prominent policymakers, usually to no avail.
“This is not a time for it, ask politicians,” said Alexey Venediktov, the editor-in-chief of the Echo of Moscow Broadcaster.
The rain began, but the doors were still closed. Outside, the people opened umbrellas and drew closer to each other to cover the ones, who had no umbrellas that day.
“Come under umbrella,” Yabloko Leader Grigory Yavlinsky told a woman nearby. “I don’t think commenting will be decent this moment,” Yavlinsky made clear to a TV reporter, who was also close to him.
The doors opened at 2:00 a.m. sharp and the people slowly moved into the hall. Killing journalists is never traced in Russia, said a reporter of Italian TV against background of mourners.
There were many willing to speak at the coffin that day. So the funeral ceremony turned into a funeral meeting after a while. But it didn’t last long. Two thousand more in the street wanted to pay the last respect. So the rear doors of the hall finally opened to let the people outside. The salute and the national anthem sounded, not in Anna Politkovskaya's honor though. A military officer was laid to rest nearby.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Oct. 11, 2006
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