On Monday morning Sergei Protazanov, 40-year-old layout artist at the Civic Concord newspaper in Khimki, died following an attack a few days earlier. On the morning of 27 March Protazanov was attacked near 64, Jubileiny prospect in Khimki. He was taken to hospital and doctors diagnosed concussion and extensive bruising. Sergei refused to stay in the hospital.

“He was beaten in the already traditional manner,” said Protazanov’s colleague Yury Slyusarev. “First an unexpected blow to the head from behind. Then a person loses consciousness and they begin to kick him. I talked to Seryozha yesterday: we had to do the layout for the latest issue. He said he was moving with difficulty and complained of fits of nausea. However, he was in good spirits.”

Friends of Sergei Protazanov are certain that the attack was linked to his work for the newspaper. “There are too many coincidences,” believes Anatoly Yurov, chief editor of the Civic Concord (Grazhdanskoe soglasie) newspaper. “Of the three active members of our editorial staff he was the only one not yet to have been attacked. Sergei was disabled, he had one arm, so he could not defend himself.”

Civic Concord, which writes about political and public matters, is the last newspaper in Khimki, a town on the northwest edge of Moscow, that still dares to criticise mayor Vladimir Strelchenko, a member of the ruling United Russia party. Other local newspapers have stopped publication.

Last year Yury Granin, the chief editor of another newspaper Civic Forum (Grazhdansky forum), and the newspaper’s secretary Yury Slyusarev were attacked and the newspaper ceased to appear.

Mikhail Beketov, chief editor of Khimkinskaya Pravda, still lies in a coma, between death and life, following the beating he received in November last year.

Anatoly Yurov of Civic Concord has been attacked three times. The prosecutor’s office did not open criminal investigations into these attacks, however. After the third attack Yurov wrote a letter to President Putin, appealing to be protected from the lawless behaviour of the local authorities. A few days later unidentified individuals attacked him near the newspaper offices and stabbed him 10 times.

The Investigative Committee  of the Khimki town prosecutor’s office says “we have not yet opened a criminal investigation into the death of Sergei Protazanov. Inquires are being made.”