Madam, - The killing of Anna Politkovskaya, the highly acclaimed Moscow journalist, appears to be another shocking episode in the barbarous Russian repression of Chechnya.
It has even been alleged that the silencing of her criticism of Russia's campaign of terror in Chechnya was meant as a birthday present for President Putin .
Aaron Rhodes, executive director of the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights, commented: "Insofar as the tragic conflict [in Chechnya] is known and understood at all, it is due in large part to her professionalism and tenacity, for which she appears to have paid with her life."
Meanwhile, the persecution of the Chechen people continues. According to a recent IHF statement, torture has "assumed epidemic proportions in Chechnya because of the climate of impunity that has been allowed to prevail in this republic over a decade".
It appears that Western dependence on Russian gas and oil implies an almost total disregard for the very survival of the Chechen people.
The tragic death of Anna Politkovskaya brings home the real danger that such heroic human rights defenders face daily. In Serbia, for example, leading human rights activists have taken a similar stand to Politkovskaya's in exposing the torture and repression done in the name of their own country.
Such outstanding witnesses for human rights deserve much more explicit and forceful support from EU political leaders than they have so far received. - Yours, etc,
VALERIE HUGHES, Cabra, Dublin 7.