Arrests Made in Killing of Anastasia Baburova

An older but tragic story. The Killing of Anastasia Baburova, a bright idealistic reporter who refused to sell out. as well as the killing of Stanislav Markelov was one of the great crimes that has occurred in recent memory. (Not for nothing these are the people who should have gotten the Nobel Peace Prize). Now are those arrested patsies, or

MOSCOW — Two young people identified as ultranationalists will face charges in the January shooting that killed a crusading lawyer and a reporter, an attack that cast a pall over Russia’s dwindling circle of human rights activists.

Prosecutors on Thursday announced the arrest of Nikita Tikhonov and Yevgenia Khasis, both in their 20s, who appeared in court with black hoods over their heads. The chief of Russia’s Federal Security Service, Aleksandr Bortnikov, said that the suspects were identified during a crackdown on extremist groups in Moscow, and that the killer had confessed.

The attack on the lawyer, Stanislav Markelov, and the reporter, Anastasia Baburova, was brazen even by Moscow standards. As the two victims left a daytime news conference a few blocks from the Kremlin, a masked man ran up behind them and shot Mr. Markelov, 34, in the head at point-blank range. He then fatally shot Ms. Baburova, a 25-year-old reporter trainee who hadbeen interviewing Mr. Markelov, and escaped into a crowded subway station.

After a briefing on the arrests, Russia’s president, Dmitri A. Medvedev, said ultranationalist attacks “are not simply grave crimes, but crimes which have great resonance in society.” He said he was pleased that the case had been solved in such a short time — around 10 months after the shootings — and hoped that “such reports will come regularly.”

And who were the alleged killers, by all accounts ultra-nationalists with numerous connections to various fascist groups that populate Russia and have received backing from the Putin Government for the past decade.