Former President of the Czech Republic, Vaclav Havel, issues an op/ed on the disturbingly long string of high-profile murder victims in Russia, including Eduard Chuvashov, Stanislav Markelov, Natalya Estemirova, Maksharip Aushev, and Ivan Khutorsko.  A little later on, it seems, the op/ed was signed by several more international luminaries:  Prince El Hassan bin Talal, Andre Glucksmann , Frederik Willem de Klerk, Hans Küng, Yohei Sasakawa, Karel Schwarzenberg, Desmond Tutu, Richard von Weizsäcker and Grigory Yavlinsky.

We urge the Russian government to break this chain of human tragedy once and for all. In permitting the murder of people whose only purpose is the preservation of human dignity, Russia is losing its hope for a better future.  At the very least, the Russian authorities are failing in the central task of any government: to protect the lives and physical safety of all its citizens. Making matters worse, none of these murders has been properly investigated and none of the perpetrators has been brought to justice.