Russian newspaper worker dies after street attack

A newspaper page designer has died after being beaten near his home in a Moscow suburb. It was the latest of a string of attacks on journalists in Russia.

Sergei Protazanov was found by a passer-by on Sunday as he lay on a sidewalk in the town of Khimki. He was taken to hospital and later discharged. He died at home on Monday.

His editor, Anatoly Yurov, of the newspaper Grazhdanskoye Soglasiye, said that Protazanov had told him by telephone from hospital on Sunday that he had been attacked. On Monday, he told him from home that "Everything hurts — on the inside and on the outside. I cannot move," Yurov said.

Yurov said that police told Protazanov's wife that her husband's death was probably caused either by food he ate at the hospital or medication.