Russian journalist Oksana, 42, gave up a gilded life to speak out against Putin. This week RICHARD PENDLEBURY laid flowers where she was killed by a 120mm mortar round while reporting from Kyiv

• Oksana Baulina rubbed shoulders with the wives of Kremlin's favoured oligarchs
• One of her civilian companions also died, and escorting policeman wounded
• She is of at least seven journalists known to be killed in the month-long war so far

By RICHARD PENDLEBURY AND JAMIE WISEMAN FOR THE DAILY MAIL
PUBLISHED: 22:18, 25 March 2022 | UPDATED: 08:55, 26 March 2022

Oksana Baulina could have just shut up and enjoyed the 'good life'. She was a Moscow fashion magazine editor.

She wore gold Ugg boots and drank champagne at catwalk parties. She rubbed shoulders with the wives and girlfriends of the Kremlin's favoured oligarchs.

It was a far cry from her upbringing in a grim, industrial city in Siberia. Who could have blamed her if she had closed her eyes to the politics of the kleptocracy? She had it all, it seemed.

And then she gave it all up. This week Oksana, 42, died for her principles: A dissident in exile, on a shabby pavement next to an access road to a car park at the rear of the devastated Retroville shopping centre in Kyiv.

She was killed by a 120mm mortar round, fired by her fellow countrymen as she reported from the other side of the front line of Vladimir Putin's squalid war. One of her civilian companions also died. An escorting policeman was grievously wounded.

Yesterday the Daily Mail laid lilies on the spot where Oksana – our wholly admirable colleague and the personification of why journalism matters – made the ultimate sacrifice. She is one of at least seven journalists known to be killed in this month-long war.


Oksana Baulina, a Russian journalist, pictured, was killed by a 120mm mortar round, fired by her fellow countrymen as she reported from the other side of the front line of Vladimir Putin's squalid war. One of her civilian companions also died. An escorting policeman was grievously wounded

Through the words of friends and former colleagues, we also pieced together a remarkable life that was ended by the regime she chose to oppose.

She had given up her old existence to work for the Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny who, this week, was jailed for nine years on trumped-up charges in a Russian court.

In 2019 she had launched his YouTube channel – Navalny Live – for which she continued to work until February 2020. The following year she went into exile for her own safety and eventually settled in Kyiv. She had begun her climb to the top at the Moscow edition of the British listings magazine Time Out. When she was killed she was working as an editorial assistant at the independent Russian website The Insider.

Sofia, a heartbroken close friend of the journalist, spoke to me yesterday. 'Oksana was a bright, shiny, beautiful, amazing person – emotional, brave and completely uncompromising,' said Sofia.

'She possessed a heightened sense of justice: That's why she couldn't stay away when someone she cared about was in trouble. She was the only journalist I know who took a brave step and switched her career from the entertainment industry to the opposite – fighting the regime.

Truvelisback:


Why do people who speak ill abt Putin always end up experience tragedy?

sapientia:


Putin is the proverbial mother who eats her younglings