15:46, 19 February 2026

The 18th temporary plaque was destroyed on Anna Politkovskaya's house.

Unknown persons tore down the 18th homemade memorial plaque on the building where Novaya Gazeta journalist Anna Politkovskaya lived and was murdered.

As the Caucasian Knot reported, on January 18, the memorial plaque, which had hung for almost 20 years on the wall of the building on Lesnaya Street in Moscow where Novaya Gazeta columnist Anna Politkovskaya lived and was shot, was smashed for the first time. Civil Initiative activists installed a temporary plaque in its place, but it was also destroyed on January 19. On the evening of February 18, activists installed the 18th homemade memorial plaque on the facade of Politkovskaya's building.

One of the plaques, installed by Yabloko party activists, remained up for a week and a half, but was also destroyed on February 6. Activists then painted the original text from the broken memorial plaque ("Anna Politkovskaya lived in this building and was vilely murdered on October 7, 2006") onto the building's facade. Representatives of a far-right organization designated as terrorist claimed responsibility for the destruction of the first plaque. The man who smashed a memorial plaque has been fined 1,000 rubles, although he denied any wrongdoing, claiming the plaque "fell and broke on its own."

The 18th homemade memorial plaque on the building on Lesnaya Street where Novaya Gazeta journalist Anna Politkovskaya lived and was murdered has been destroyed again by unknown assailants. The plaque, placed on the evening of February 18, had disappeared by midday today, RusNews reports.

Any civic expression, whether a plaque in memory of Anna Politkovskaya or a "Last Address" sign for a victim of Stalin's repressions, provokes active aggression among supporters of the government in Russia. Impunity encourages acts of vandalism committed without direct orders from above, human rights activists and a journalist interviewed by the "Caucasian Knot" indicated.

Anna Politkovskaya, known for her articles on the war and human rights violations in Chechnya, was murdered in Moscow on October 7, 2006. The court found that Lom-Ali Gaitukayev had organized the murder, and he was sentenced to life imprisonment. Rustam Makhmudov has been identified as the perpetrator, according to the "Caucasian Knot" report "The Murder of Anna Politkovskaya".

Last Interview Anna Politkovskaya gave to a "Caucasian Knot" correspondent an hour and a half before her death. In this interview, the journalist commented on Ramzan Kadyrov's career prospects.

In 2025, on the 19th anniversary of Anna Politkovskaya's murder, residents of Moscow and St. Petersburg brought flowers to her grave, the Novaya Gazeta office, and the memorial to the victims of repression. Some of those convicted in the case of her murder have already been released, but the person who ordered it has not yet been convicted, Politkovskaya's colleagues recalled.

On the fifth anniversary of Politkovskaya's murder, journalists and human rights activists at a rally in Tbilisi highlighted her contribution to the fight for freedom of speech, demanding that those who ordered her murder be identified.

"Caucasian Knot" publishes materials dedicated to Politkovskaya on the thematic page "Politkovskaya and Estemirova", which contains materials and about Anna's friend, journalist and human rights activist Natalia Estemirova, who was killed in 2009 and also worked on the problems of the residents of Chechnya. We have updated the apps for Android and Android. href="https://apps.apple.com/ru/app/%D0%BA%D0%B0%D0%B2%D0%BA%D0%B0%D0%B7%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9-%D1%83%D0%B7%D0%B5%D0%BB/id1154933161">IOS! We would be grateful for criticism and ideas for development both in Google Play/App Store and on KU pages in social networks. Without installing a VPN, you can read us on Telegram (in Dagestan, Chechnya and Ingushetia - with VPN). Using a VPN, you can continue reading "Caucasian Knot" on the website as usual, and on social networks: Facebook*, Instagram*, "VKontakte", "Odnoklassniki" and X. You can watch the "Caucasian Knot" video on YouTube. Send messages to +49 157 72317856 on WhatsApp*, to the same number on Telegram, or write to @Caucasian_Knot.

* Meta (owner of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp) is banned in Russia.

Translated automatically via Google translate from https://www.kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/420943