In Dagestan, court fines "Novoe Delo" journalists for their reviews

The Sovietskiy District Court of Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan, has obliged journalists of the newspaper "Novoe Delo" to pay out 12,000 roubles to Zaur Gaziev, journalist of the newspaper "Free Republic", who was dissatisfied with reviews on his articles and fairy tale.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that consideration of Zaur Gaziev's civil suit on defence of his honour and dignity and compensation of moral damage began at the Federal Court of the Sovietskiy District of Makhachkala on March 19. The respondents are journalists of the newspaper "Novoe Delo" Natalia Krainova and Svetlana Anokhina.

Ms Anokhina published a critical review on Gaziev's fairy tale "Twins" and accused the author of illiteracy, having written: "He can easily confuse a raincoat with a shroud and an earl with a decanter (both word pairs sound similar in Russian, - note of the interpreter)," pointed to illiterate, in Anokhina's opinion, use by Gaziev of the word "shroud" in his column published in the newspaper "Chernovik", as the "Echo Moskvy" Radio reports. Ms Krainova named Gaziev's professional journalistic activity "throwing poops."

The claim in total made over 3 million roubles. As a result, the court has obliged each of the respondents to pay 12,000 roubles to Gaziev, as the "Gazeta.Ru" reports. Both parties remained dissatisfied with the decision and plan to appeal against it.