Berkovych and Petriychuk awarded the Polytkovskaya Prize

The ceremony of awarding the Anna Politkovskaya “Camerton” prize, established by “Novaya Gazeta”, took place in Moscow.

The jury unanimously awarded the award to director Evgenia Berkovich and playwright Svetlana Petriychuk, who are currently in pretrial detention on charges of justifying terrorism. Berkovich’s husband Nikolay Matveev and actress Marietta Tsihal-Polyschuk received “Camertons” for them.

The special “Camerton against the odds” prize, awarded for the first time, was awarded to a team of journalists who organized a solidarity marathon in support of the “You are not alone” political prisoners. It was impossible for the organizers of the action to attend the ceremony due to persecution by the Russian authorities, so the prize was given to lawyer Anna Stavitskaya.

Also during the ceremony, an auction was held in support of the St. Petersburg artist Sasha Skochylenko, who has been under arrest for more than a year on charges of discrediting the Russian army. Ksenia Sorokina, the scenographer of Evgenia Berkovich and Svetlana Petriychuk’s play “Finist Yasny Sokol”, presented the highest theater award of Russia “Golden Mask”, awarded to the production, as a lot. As a result, the lot was purchased for 500,000 rubles by Alexey Venediktov, the former chief editor of the Echo of Moscow radio station.

It is reported that the auction was conducted by the former mayor of Yekaterinburg Yevgeny Roizman, and the “Camerton” presentation ceremony itself was conducted by the journalist of “Novaya Gazeta” Yelena Milashyna.

• The independent prize named after Anna Politkovskaya “Camerton” was established by the editorial office of “Novaya Gazeta” in 2013. It is awarded “for outstanding achievements in the field of human rights protection, for courage and consistency in defending the principles of freedom of speech, for honesty, dignity, civic responsibility and human compassion.”
• A criminal case on the public justification of terrorism against Evgenia Berkovich and Svetlana Petriychuk was initiated in early May. The occasion was the play “Finist Yasnyi Sokol”, staged by Berkovych based on the play by Petriychuk. The play tells about the fate of Russian women who married Islamic radicals and were subsequently recruited into the “Islamic State” movement, recognized as terrorist in many countries of the world, including Russia. The basis of the criminal case is the examination written by Roman Silantiev, who calls himself a destructologist. Silantiev considered that Wahhabism is supported in the play and performance. At the same time, the production, which has been running with great success since 2019, was twice awarded the main Russian theater award “Golden Mask” – for the best direction and the best work of the costume designer.
• Novaya Gazeta journalist Anna Politkovskaya was killed in Moscow, in the doorway of her home on October 7, 2006. Politkovskaya was known for her investigations into human rights violations in Chechnya and her criticism of the policies of Russian President Vladimir Putin and the head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov. The perpetrators of the crime have not yet been found. Politkovskaya’s relatives and colleagues believe that they could be people from Kadyrov’s closest circle.