News is leaking out of an alleged plot by the Russian secret service, the FSB, to assassinate my friend Akhmed Zakayev. While not formally involved with the work of the Chechnya Peace Forum, Akhmed's tireless work campaigning for a free, independent, and democratic Chechnya is something that inspired the formation of the organisation. The alleged plot uncovered by MI6 is yet another example of the lengths some within the Russian state will go to silence Russia's critics. Depressingly the threats to Akhmed's life are not particularly new and the murder of Anna Politkovskaya in Moscow and Alexander Litvinenko in London have long-proved that threats of extra-judicial killings from the Kremlin are anything but hollow.

I must praise the British government for continuing to offer asylum to Akhmed and for offering him protection against the people who are trying so hard to silence him. As I said in my blog last week, the world needs people like Akhmed who continue to talk about human rights, democracy, and the rule of law and by doing so make sure that authoritarian governments across the world cannot continue acting with impunity.

Akhmed will continue his campaigning work and I know he will refuse to be cowed by the threats made against his life. In a recent interview with the Independent Akhmed was asked about how he feels about living in fear, he simply said:   "I do not want to die. Alexander and Anna did not want to die. But for the hundreds of my friends who are gone, I have to keep speaking." In Britain at least he will have the freedom, if not the total security, to do so. For the thousands living in the Caucasus such freedom is unimaginable due to the Kremlin's stranglehold. If the Chechnya Peace Forum can add any pressure on those who would kill campaigners either at home or on foreign soil, it will be a victory.

Ivar Amundsen
Director, Chechnya Peace Forum