Journalist barred from entering Russia after visit to Israel

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
A reporter for a Russian news magazine on Sunday was denied entry to the country on orders from the top KGB successor agency in what journalists and rights activists denounced as the latest attack on the freedom of speech. Natalia Morar, an investigative reporter for the New Times weekly magazine, was returning from a trip to Israel when border guards at Moscow's Domodedovo airport told her she wasn't allowed to enter the country. Morar said on Ekho Moskvy radio that border guards had told her that she was barred from entering Russia on orders from the Federal Security Service, the main KGB successor agency. Morar, a citizen of the ex-Soviet nation of Moldova, was forced to fly there. Morar said border guards refused to name themselves, give any details about the order or explain its reasons. Officials at the Federal Security Service made no immediate comment on the case Sunday.