1. Yuri Shchekochikhin died suddenly on 3 July 2003 from a mysterious illness a few days before his scheduled departure to the United States, where he planned to meet with FBI investigators.
13 Facts About Yuri Shchekochikhin
1. 2.
Yuri Shchekochikhin was born in Kirovabad, Azerbaijan SSR in June 1950 and was of Azerbaijani origin.
3.
Yuri Shchekochikhin graduated from the Journalism Department of Moscow State University in 1975.
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Yuri Shchekochikhin worked as an investigative journalist at Komsomolskaya Pravda and Literaturnaya Gazeta, and then as a deputy editor of the liberal newspaper Novaya Gazeta.
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Yuri Shchekochikhin began his political career in 1990, when he was elected as a representative to the Congress of People's Deputies.
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Yuri Shchekochikhin was elected to the Russian State Duma from the liberal Yabloko party in 1995.
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Yuri Shchekochikhin was a member of a Duma committee on the problems of corruption, and was a UN expert on the problems of organized crime.
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Yuri Shchekochikhin was a vocal opponent of the First and Second Chechen Wars.
9.
From 2002, Yuri Shchekochikhin was a member of the Sergei Kovalev Commission, which investigated allegations that the 1999 Moscow apartment bombings had been orchestrated by the Russian Federal Security Service to generate support for the war.
10.
In June 2003, Yuri Shchekochikhin contacted the FBI and received an American visa to discuss the case with US authorities.
11.
Yuri Shchekochikhin died suddenly on 3 July 2003 after a mysterious 16-day illness.
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Yuri Shchekochikhin's relatives were denied an official medical report about the cause of his illness, and were forbidden to take specimens of his tissues for an independent medical investigation.
13.
Yuri Shchekochikhin's last published book was Slaves of the KGB: 20th Century.