Assignment Moscow: new edition out on May 18
THE NEW EDITION OF ‘ASSIGNMENT MOSCOW: REPORTING ON RUSSIA FROM LENIN TO PUTIN’ will be published in the U.K. and U.S. on May 18.
It includes new material covering the Covid-19 pandemic; the jailing of the Russian opposition politician, Alexei Navalny, and, of course, Russia’s escalation of its war on Ukraine in February 2022.
One of the consequences of the war is that the practice of independent journalism–for many years getting harder and harder in Russia–has now become impossible. The new edition has been in press since September 2022, but in a new concluding chapter covering the period since the Kremlin’s assault began the previous February, I warn of the danger that international correspondents might now be jailed in Russia. The imprisonment of Evan Gershkovich of the Wall Street Journal shows that the risk was real.
Along with surely every international reporter who has ever worked in Russia, I hope for Mr Gershkovich’s release as soon as possible.
I hope that the book, and especially the new material, will provide valuable context to understanding Russia’s recent history, and the way that the media has become part of it. Our relations with Russia are now worse than at any time in my adult life, yet, as I argued in a recent post on here
One day this war will end, and the US, UK, EU and others will have to forge a new relationship with Russia. It is unlikely to be one of friendship–but even one accepting distance, division, and discord can better be managed by the kind of dialogue of which journalism can be the starting point. Let not understanding be yet another casualty of this media war. Let journalists do their jobs.
My thanks to everyone who bought the original edition of the book. I had no idea then that its subject would become so central to Russia’s current confrontation with the West. In the new edition, I have tried to explain why that matters so much.
This week, I have commented on events in Russia for ITV News at 10, and recently had a long article on the battle of Stalingrad, and its significance today, published in The New European. I am available for speaking engagements and media appearances to talk about the book or about Russia and the war in Ukraine. You can contact me via this site, or, for enquiries specifically relating to the book, through mollie.broad@bloomsbury.com.
