Paul Klebnikov

Early life

Paul Klebnikov came from a New York family of Russian American White émigrés with a deep history in military and political affairs. His ancestor Ivan Pushchin, a Decembrist, was sent to Siberia after the 1825 revolt, and his great-grandfather Arkady Nebolsin, a White Russian admiral, was assassinated by Bolsheviks. Known as a reckless child, he once swam in a hurricane. He studied at St. Bernard's School and Phillips Exeter Academy, then earned a BA in political science from UC Berkeley in 1984.

After completing US Marine Corps Officer Candidates School, he turned down the commission. He went on to earn a PhD at the London School of Economics, where he received the Leonard Schapiro Prize for Russian studies. His dissertation focused on post-Stolypin agrarian reform in Russia. From 1987 to 1988, he taught at the Institute of European Studies in London.

Reporting on Russia

Klebnikov started at Forbes in 1989, where he became known for digging into shady post-Soviet business and corruption. His 1996 cover story, "Godfather of the Kremlin?", drew a comparison between Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky and the Sicilian mafia. Though the piece ran without a byline, it was widely attributed to Klebnikov. After receiving death threats, he left Russia for Paris with his family.

Berezovsky sued Forbes for libel in a British court—a move several experts called libel tourism—and secured a partial retraction in 2003. Klebnikov turned the article into a 2000 book, Godfather of the Kremlin: Boris Berezovsky and the Looting of Russia, which called Yeltsin's privatization "the robbery of the century" and laid out alleged corruption among Russian business figures. The New York Times called it "richly detailed" and "effectively angry."

In 2003, he published Conversation with a Barbarian: Interviews with a Chechen Field Commander on Banditry and Islam, a transcript of his talk with rebel leader Khozh-Ahmed Noukhayev. That same year, he became the first editor of Forbes's Russian edition. Because his wife and children didn't want to relocate to Russia, he agreed to the post for just one year. Only four issues were released before his death, one of which covered Russia's 100 richest people.

Murder

On the night of July 9, 2004, Paul Klebnikov was leaving Forbes’ Moscow office when attackers in a slow-moving car shot him four times. He survived the initial assault but later died at a hospital; the ambulance carrying him lacked an oxygen bottle, and a broken hospital elevator caused further delays. Officials labeled the killing a contract hit. The Russian Forbes publisher said the murder was “definitely linked” to Klebnikov’s reporting.

Some speculated a story on Russia’s 100 richest people or businessman Boris Berezovsky might have been involved. In 2006, prosecutors accused Chechen rebel leader Khozh-Ahmed Noukhayev—the subject of Klebnikov’s book A Conversation with a Barbarian—of ordering the attack. Three Chechen men were arrested, tried in a closed proceeding, and acquitted. Russia’s Supreme Court later overturned those acquittals, allowing new trials, but the suspects could not be found and the case stalled.

In July 2009, Russian authorities reopened the suspended investigation and said they no longer believed Noukhayev masterminded the murder, though they still thought he played a role.

Legacy

In 2004, Klebnikov was one of four journalists given the Committee to Protect Journalists' International Press Freedom Award after his death. The Paul Klebnikov Fund was created to honor him, giving out an annual courage prize and offering internships for young Russian journalists at Western outlets. Project Klebnikov, launched in July 2005, is a group of more than 20 journalists and media partners working to uncover details about his murder and continue his investigations. Richard Behar leads the organization.