‘Nezavisimaya’ Editor Defends Publishing Garbuzov as ‘Norm in Modern Society’

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 10 – Nezavisimiya Gazeta has published two controversial articles by Valery Garbuzov, the now former director of the Moscow Institute for the Study of the USA and Canada (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/09/moscows-usa-and-canada-institute_2.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/09/ousted-usa-and-canada-institute-head.html).

            Garbuzov has been savaged for suggesting that the Kremlin is making foreign policy mistakes because it has been blinded by its own “illusions” about the nature of the rest of the world; and Nezavisimaya Gazeta in turn has been denounced by supporters of the Putin regime because it chose to publish Garbuzov’s argument and defense.

            Now, Konstantin Remchukov, the editor-in-chief of the independent Moscow daily, has issued a statement in defense of what his paper has done, arguing that it is no special case driven by some external forces but the continuation of a tradition the paper has followed since its founding (ng.ru/politics/2023-09-10/100_133910092023.html).

            An informal translation of Remchukov’s statement follows:

After the publication of Valery Garbuzov’s article in Nezavisimaya Gazeta, a heated discussion ensued about the motives for its appearance in general and in our newspaper in particular.

Garbuzov answered about “in general” in his second publication with us last week.

 

As for the reasons for the appearance of this text on the pages of NG, the following should be kept in mind.

 

We, Nezavisimaya Gazeta, are an expert newspaper. That has been true from the very beginning of the paper’s existence. According to the tradition of the publication, materials coming to the editorial office from the heads of academic and research institutes of the Russian Academy of Sciences are almost always published in one of the headings: “Carte Blanche,” “That’s How I See It” or “Ideas and People”.

The article by Garbuzov, director of the Institute for the Study of the USA and Canada and a corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, which came to NG, met the criteria for publication 100%. I do not edit current directors of academic institutions. 

Therefore, it went to print in the same form that it arrived to us.

I would like this explanation to be accepted as the substantive position of our publication and to put an end to the speculation and pseudo-analysis of those who saw here political intrigue, conspiracy, foreign hand, etc.

Publishing controversial materials is the norm in modern society.