RIA Novosti chief editor calls for delicate approach to history

RIA Novosti chief editor Svetlana Mironyuk's comment to gazeta.ru online edition

The “RIA and Stalin” story unfolded according to the classical “storm in a teacup” scenario. Initially just a story like many others, it grew out of a journalist’s mistake, poor knowledge of the subject, or bias and adherence to stereotypes. Unfortunately, it caused an uproar and great damage to the reputation of RIA Novosti.

I see two elements in this situation, a personal and a public one.

The personal element is the desire of Andrew Rettman, who works for www.EUobserver.com, to find or create a sensation where none exists. To get the details, read the RIA Novosti press release and also Rettman’s article about RIA Novosti and Stalin.

In essence, Rettman writes that somebody told somebody else about Russia’s efforts to “improve the image of Joseph Stalin,” as if anyone can improve the image of historical personas. History puts everyone in his or her rightful place, sooner or later. He further claims that RIA Novosti “is trying to recruit one of the top 10 PR firms in Brussels to put the project in play.”

Also, according to him, RIA Novosti plans to hold a high-level conference about the Arctic in Moscow in late November, which “is likely to be followed up by similar conferences in the Middle East and the Far East next year.”

But this is just another eurorumor. Rettman asked RIA Novosti journalists to comment on it, but they laughed at the idea of improving Stalin’s image and said about the Middle East project that the agency would soon resume the publication of the Arabic-language newspaper Anba Mosku (The Moscow News) in 16 countries.

They also told him about the agency’s plans to host a major conference on the Arctic within the framework of the Valdai international discussion club of experts, which was first held six years ago with the assistance of RIA Novosti.

As for plans in the Far East, the EUobserver journalist was probably referring to the upcoming launch of the RIA Novosti economic news line in the Chinese language.

But this is not a sensation; this is routine work of a large multiformat news holding called RIA Novosti. This is why Andrew Rettman did not hear – or refused to hear – what the RIA Novosti journalists told him. Instead, he opted for fusing all these unexciting elements in such a way as to create a sensation.

I can only describe this as journalistic bias and proof that Rettman worked to order in this case. I have never supported conspiracy theories, but I was shocked back into reality when Rettman published his cynical article four days before the Day of Memory for Victims of Political Repression in Russia, although RIA Novosti had clearly formulated its stand. Surprisingly, many other media reprinted it three days later following in the footsteps of their colleagues from Georgia, who were the first to take up the sensation, without checking the information or asking RIA Novosti journalists to comment.

What is this? A serious professional crisis of journalism? Or the end of professional ethics, journalistic solidarity and professional honesty?

Even the Novosti Press Agency (APN), the Soviet forerunner of RIA Novosti, was never accused of defending Stalin during its 50-year history.

Moreover, Solomon Lozovsky, the founder of Sovinformburo, which was later renamed APN, was one of Stalin’s victims. He was executed in 1952. The average age of journalists at RIA Novosti today is 28, and for most of them Stalinism is a shocking, but very old page in Russia’s history.

On a personal level, I can say that the great-grandmother of my elder son spent ten years in the Gulag labor camps after her father was shot in 1937, the peak of Stalin’s persecution campaign. My generation, aged around 40, grew up during Gorbachev’s perestroika. The brightest events of my student years – I studied in Europe – were the fall of the Berlin Wall, the execution of Romanian dictator Ceausescu, and the dissolution of the socialist bloc countries in Eastern Europe.

A few words about the public elements of that trumped-up sensation: Imagine the reaction of journalists to the news that a respected German media plans to improve the image of Hitler, or that a respected Spanish news agency will highlight positive elements of Franco’s regime, or that Italians intend to rehabilitate Mussolini at the state level. Would everyone believe the news? No, and nobody would publish such silly concoctions. Why then do people believe similar rumors about Russia, despite an official refutation?

It is true that we in Russia have made many mistakes and have only ourselves to blame for this adverse view of our country. We have not been doing much to help other people understand Russia; but then, few people really want to do so, and this is the biggest problem. This is what we should try to change, instead of taking offense.

History today has become an issue of political confrontation at the interstate level. Nearly all meetings the Russian president and prime minister had in Europe in the past year touched on history in one way or another, and some of them turned into heated battles when Russia was accused of crimes without reliable proof. The first question members of the Valdai Discussion Club asked Vladimir Putin during their meeting this year was about his assessment of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact.

The use of historical differences as an instrument of pressure has become fashionable in East European countries’ policy. Why don’t historical claims dominate bilateral relations of countries whose history has been inseparably intertwined, such as Spain and France, France and Britain, or Poland and Germany? Why do they practice mutual tolerance instead, seeking factors that unite them and ignoring facts that can push them apart?

I think politicians should consider an intellectual moratorium on the use of different interpretations of certain historical events of the 20th century in interstate relations.

Europe has a treaty on the inviolability of post-war borders. Its countries could also sign a treaty on the inadmissibility of reviewing history or using it as an instrument for attaining practical objectives. History is too fragile for this. It is when somebody has no other argument that they resort to the fail-safe instrument of diverging interpretations of historical facts.

In my opinion, we should stop demanding that any country ask forgiveness for the events of the distant past, and we must not appeal to other countries and supranational institutions to assess events in history. This will only lead us into a dead-end and total absurdity. For example, should Russia demand that Mongolia repent its 300-year domination of Russia, which some historians say never happened?

I don’t say that we should forget the historical drama, turn the page and pragmatically proceed without stopping to analyze the past. No, this can only lead to historical amnesia, moral poverty and social degeneracy. But repentance is possible only when society, and not the powers-that-be, formulates a generally accepted assessment of events, like it happened in Germany, where the foreign policy of the government reflects the aspirations and beliefs of society.

There are other possibilities. Take Spain, a country that was split by a ruthless civil war in the 20th century, where both the supporters of the fascist Franco regime and its victims and fighters are still living. People in Spain visit the monuments of the Franco period but there is a national consensus that this issue must never be used to split the nation or incite public wrath. Time must pass before events can be assessed correctly without splitting society.

The decades of Stalin’s totalitarian rule are a highly delicate issue for Russia, where many people still remember that dramatic period. However, we have not yet formed public consensus on its assessment. Russia needs more time, as it only rose from the ruins of the Soviet Union less than 20 years ago. We should encourage a public discussion of professional historians in the country and joint debates with colleagues from other countries representing different historical schools. But these discussions must not be allowed to become political or to complicate relations.

The article alleging a link between Stalin and RIA Novosti has made it obvious that RIA Novosti must launch this historical project and promote a professional dialogue with European and American historians on complicated historical issues that concern modern Russia. The vacuum must be filled.  Such professional dialogue will eventually lead to a public discussion that should provide assessments and lead to practical actions. RIA Novosti will do its best to promote such a dialogue.

Are we going to take Rettman to court? I don’t think so, because it is always a bad idea for one media to sue another, and because I still believe in the objectivity and high professional standards of the European school of journalism. I am going to write a letter to the editor-in-chief of EUobserver, offering the details of this unfortunate situation and asking her to clarify the situation, when the article they published created a storm in a teacup.