- Colleagues of a Russian journalist who was thought to have been assassinated in Ukraine on Tuesday went wild when they saw him reemerge at a press conference on Wednesday.
- Arkady Babchenko appeared at a press conference in Kyiv after the Ukrainian security service (SBU) announced that his assassination had been staged to catch a would-be assassin.
- The SBU said Russia paid $30,000 to carry out the hit.
- But other journalists have questioned the consequences of the sting, and Babchenko's role in it, despite his life being on the line.
Colleagues of a Russian journalist who was thought to have been assassinated in Ukraine on Tuesday went wild when they saw him reemerge at a press conference on Wednesday.
Arkady Babchenko, 41, appeared at a press conference in Kyiv after the Ukrainian security service (SBU) announced that his assassination had been staged to catch a would-be assassin. The SBU said Russia paid the would-be assassin $30,000 to carry out the hit.
The SBU also said that the assassin was apprehended.
In the RFERL video below, Babchenko's stood and cheered and clapped when they saw him alive on television at the press conference.
—Радіо Свобода (@radiosvoboda) May 30, 2018
Babchenko, a prominent Russian war reporter and Kremlin critic, was previously reported to have been shot at his Kyiv apartment, then dying in an ambulance on the way to the hospital.
Babchenko was critical of Russia's annexation of Crimea and its operations in Syria, and was forced to flee Russia in February 2017 because of threats to him and his family.
But other journalists have questioned the consequences of the sting, and Babchenko's role in it, despite his life being on the line.
—Jack Losh (@jacklosh) May 30, 2018
—Noah Sneider (@NoahSneider) May 30, 2018
—Joshua Yaffa (@yaffaesque) May 30, 2018
—natalia antelava (@antelava) May 30, 2018
—Lindsey Hilsum (@lindseyhilsum) May 30, 2018
—Leonid Ragozin (@leonidragozin) May 30, 2018
—Alec Luhn (@ASLuhn) May 30, 2018
—David Filipov (@davidfilipov) May 30, 2018
