Oleg Kashin

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Oleg Kashin
Олег Владимирович Кашин
Kashin at the Vladimir Mayakovsky Central City Public Library in Saint Petersburg, 2014
Born
Oleg Vladimirovich Kashin

(1980-06-17) 17 June 1980 (age 43)
NationalityRussian
Occupation(s)Journalist, writer, columnist, blogger

Oleg Vladimirovich Kashin (Russian: Оле́г Влади́мирович Ка́шин; born 17 June 1980) is a Russian journalist and writer known for his political articles.

Early life[edit]

Oleg Vladimirovich Kashin was born 17 June 1980 in Kaliningrad.

In March 2003, he graduated from the Baltic Fishing Fleet State Academy in Kaliningrad with a degree a maritime navigation. Kashin sailed twice to sea on a sailing ship Kruzenshtern, being a deck hand and a navigator intern. Participant in international sailing regatta.[1][2]

Career[edit]

While studying at the Baltic State Fishing Fleet Academy, Kashin wrote for Komsomolskaya Pravda in Kaliningrad where he expressed rather sharp views. He continued to work for that newspaper up to 2003, specializing on exclusive interviews and special reports,[3] then moved to Moscow and started working as a journalist for Komsomolskaya Pravda in Moscow. After a while, he left the newspaper, became a staff writer at Kommersant and became the leading Russian journalist covering youth political movements, ranging broadly from the National Bolshevik Party to Nashi. He left Kommersant in June 2005, dissatisfied with the dismissal of the director-general Andrei Vassiliev.[3]

In 2007, Kashin became a regular author and a deputy editor of the Ŗusskaya zhizn (The Russian Life)[4] magazine.[5] In 2009, Kashin returned to Kommersant as a special correspondent.[6]

2010 attack[edit]

Pickets near Militia Headquarters, 38 Petrovka St., Moscow to demand an investigation into the attack on Oleg Kashin

On 6 November 2010, Kashin was assaulted by unknown attackers near his home in Moscow. He was hospitalized with broken jaw, fractured skull, broken leg and broken fingers, one of which later had to be amputated.[7][8] Police are treating the attack as attempted murder.[9] President Medvedev said that the assailants "must be found and punished".[9] Prior to the attack, Kashin had been reporting on the proposal to build a highway through the Khimki Forest near Moscow.[9] His reporting covering youth political movements and political protests had also prompted aggressive responses from many pro-Kremlin groups, including the Young Guard of United Russia, a youth group associated with the United Russia political party, chaired by Vladimir Putin.[10] This attack is one of the subjects of the 2012 documentary Putin's Kiss.[11]

In 2015, Kashin got acquainted with the materials of the investigation, including the testimony of the suspects, and accused Andrey Turchak of ordering the crime. This was done as a revenge for a blog post, which Turchak, then a Pskov Governor, commented on with the words "You have 24 hours to apologize. The countdown has begun." No charges were officially filed against Turchak.[12][7] In 2017, he was appointed deputy chairman of the State Duma,[13] and Putin awarded him with the Order "For Merit to the Fatherland", 2nd degree. On 27 November 2018, a full video of the interrogation of the alleged perpetrator was published, in which he said that the attack was organized by the co-owner of the "Mechanical Plant" company Alexander Gorbunov, and the customer was Turchak, who personally hurried the performers and personally demanded to break Kashin’s legs and arms so that he could not write.[14]

Views[edit]

Oleg Kashin talking to Russian president Dmitry Medvedev in Jericho, 2011

Considering the widely publicized case of Andrey Sychev, in which a young conscript lost his legs and genitalia after brutal beating by other servicemen, Kashin claimed that the case was fabricated by Committee of Soldiers Mothers: "The only proven episode... is that Sychev squatted for a while in front of now imprisoned junior sergeant Sivyakov.... All the other stuff was thought up by the chairman of Chelyabinsk Committee of Soldiers Mothers Lydmila Zinchenko, who, after giving a dozen of interviews to liberal media now cowardly conceals from investigators.[15]"

In 2014, without denying that the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation was illegal, Kashin called it a restoration of historical justice.[16] He has been covering the 2014 events in Crimea and the War in Donbass for the influential Russian nationalist publication Sputnik i Pogrom.[17][18]

He opposed the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.[19] Despite taking a strong anti-war stance and describing the actions of the Russian authorities as cannibalistic toward Ukraine and suicidal for Russia itself, he was included by Alexei Navalny's associates on a list of about 6,000 Russian "bribetakers and warmongers" who deserve to fall under international sanctions because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Kashin himself linked his inclusion on the list to the fact that he "has repeatedly criticized people who are now speaking on behalf of Navalny."[20][21][22][23]

In popular culture[edit]

In 2001, Kashin appeared on the second episode of Slaboye Zveno, the Russian version of The Weakest Link quiz show. He was voted off and gave an angry speech about his opponents.[24]

A heavily fictionalised version of Kashin played by Yevgeny Stychkin appears as one of the protagonists in the Russian journalistic procedural mini-series Just Imagine Things We Know.[25][26]

References and notes[edit]

  1. ^ "Он не смог жить без «Крузенштерна»". Комсомольская правда. Калининград. 24 July 2009. Retrieved 6 November 2010.
  2. ^ Олег Кашин (24 April 2004). "Каноническая автобиография (кратко)". Живой Журнал. Archived from the original on 7 January 2017. Retrieved 6 November 2010.
  3. ^ a b Interview with Oleg Kashin Archived 13 May 2007 at the Wayback Machine, for Sreda.Org (in Russian).
  4. ^ rulife.ru
  5. ^ "Охьел Опюбдс". RuLife.ru. Retrieved 7 May 2013.
  6. ^ Russian Wikipedia article on Kashin
  7. ^ a b Luhn, Alec. "Oleg Kashin: 'Men who nearly killed me charged but not their paymaster'". The Guardian. No. 7 September 2015. Retrieved 29 November 2018.
  8. ^ В Москве жестоко избит журналист "Коммерсанта", Lenta.ru, 6 November 2010.
  9. ^ a b c Leading Russian reporter Oleg Kashin attacked in Moscow BBC
  10. ^ "Russian Journalist Beaten in Moscow (Published 2010)". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 6 January 2023.
  11. ^ Кашин сообщил, что «с концами» вернулся в Россию «Гордон», 10.06.2015
  12. ^ Roth, Andrew (18 September 2015). "Journalist Oleg Kashin knows who tried to kill him". The Washington Post. Retrieved 29 November 2018.
  13. ^ "Official Allegedly Linked To Attack On Journalist Gets High-Level Post In Russian Parliament". Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. 8 November 2017. Retrieved 29 November 2018.
  14. ^ ""Турчак сказал: побыстрей" – допрос исполнителя покушения на Кашина". Радио Свобода (in Russian). 28 November 2018. Retrieved 28 November 2018.
  15. ^ Lie in the case of private Sychev, Oleg Kashin, magazine "Vzglyad", February 2006.
  16. ^ Кашин: Крым, конечно же, наш. Он всегда был несправедливой потерей [Kashin: Crimea is, of course, Russian. It has always been an unjust loss].
  17. ^ Russia Has Always Thought of Eastern Ukraine as Russian Land BY OLEG KASHIN - March 2, 2014
  18. ^ Олег Кашин: Репортаж из захваченного здания Донецкой обладминистрации (текст, фото, видео) [Oleg Kashin: Report from the captured building of the Regional Administration of Donetsk, 9 April 2014]
  19. ^ Zhilin, Ivan (12 May 2022). "'Russia's opposition needs to put aside their quarrels and unite against the war'".
  20. ^ Фонд борьбы с Кашиным. Справочные материалы
  21. ^ Соратники Навального составили список 6000 "разжигателей войны"
  22. ^ Ничего хорошего
  23. ^ Соратники Навального потребовали ввести международные санкции против Олега Кашина
  24. ^ Uspenskiy, Alexander. "«Вы самое слабое звено, прощайте»: жёсткая интеллектуальная игра возвращается в эфир. Какой она запомнилась" [“You are the weakest link, goodbye”: the tough mind game returns to the airwaves. How do you remember her?]. TJournal (in Russian). Retrieved 16 March 2024.
  25. ^ "Кто все эти люди: Краткий гид по «Просто представь, что мы знаем» — Статьи на Кинопоиске". Кинопоиск (in Russian). Retrieved 13 January 2023.
  26. ^ ГОРЕЛОВ, Денис (26 October 2020). "Дедушка плачет. Девочки смеются". kp.ru (in Russian). Retrieved 13 January 2023.

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