Popular Russian Television Journalist Gunned Down Yeltsin Condemns Killing, Accepts Blame For Disorder

The assassination of a popular television journalist pierced Russians’ perpetual armor of indifference Thursday, plunging the country into mourning and rekindling fears among the prominent that anyone of them could be next.

The apparent contract killing of Vladislav Listyev stunned even jaded residents of this crime-ridden capital and spotlighted the dangers of life in a lawless metropolis where corruption pervades the very security forces on which citizens once depended for protection.

President Boris Yeltsin, in a somber appearance before Listyev’s colleagues at the Ostankino television center, condemned the killing as part of “an orgy of crime” convulsing this country.

Listyev was gunned down in the entry of his central Moscow apartment building late Wednesday by a gunman or gunmen using a silencer to muffle two shots.

He was the second high-profile journalist to be slain in Moscow in five months and the latest in a harrowing spree of mob-related assassinations of wealthy business people, bankers, entertainers, sports figures and members of Parliament.

Firearms and explosives were used in the killings of 1,600 Moscow residents last year, and the number of assassinations across the country exceeded 16,800, Interior Ministry sources say.

Yeltsin condemned the killing as a vile, cowardly act and blamed himself for the collapse of security and order.

“I bow my head to you as one of the people, one of the leaders, who are guilty because they have not taken sufficient measures to combat banditry, corruption, bribe-taking and crime,” an uncharacteristically contrite Yeltsin said in a nationally televised appearance.

“We are afraid of ourselves, we are afraid of turning Russia into a police state and are afraid to toughen our struggle against these bands,” he said, vowing to strengthen law enforcement.

Yeltsin said he planned to fire Moscow’s chief prosecutor and the head of security forces for failing to stem crime or apprehend gangsters.

But an official of the federal Interior Ministry, responsible for crimefighting, retorted that the top-level bashing of Russian police and prosecutors has hastened the erosion of their credibility.

“The fact that the law enforcement system is unjustly lashed out at, criticized, humiliated, discredited, has resulted in a situation when the reputation and prestige of all the law enforcement bodies has been undermined,” said ministry spokesman Yevgeny Ryabtsev.With the killing of Listyev, “the mafia has overtly and impudently challenged the whole country, showing that it is omnipotent, that it can do everything it wants,” Ryabtsev said.

With the exception of news updates, state-run television programming was shut off in a gesture of mourning for Listyev from noon until 7 p.m. - the hour of his popular “Rush Hour” call-in program. He hosted the news-driven discussion show in the style of Larry King or Phil Donahue but was probably best known for his pioneering TV magazine “Glance.”