RUSSIA: A Whole People Are Held Hostage

By Kester Kenn Klomegah Reprint | | Print |

Kester Kenn Klomegah

MOSCOW, Sep 5 2004 (IPS) - The killings at the Beslan school in Russia are only the gravest in a long campaign of attacks and hostage taking by Chechen separatists.

The killings at the Beslan school in Russia are only the gravest in a long campaign of attacks and hostage taking by Chechen separatists.

The separatists have led a long campaign to take mainly Muslim Chechnya province out of the Russian Federation.

Their attacks have created a dilemma for President Vladimir Putin whether to continue with his refusal to negotiate with the radical groups or to soften his line to meet some of their demands.

Only last week a Sibir Airlines TU-154 with 38 passengers and eight crew on board on way from Moscow to the Black Sea resort Sochi crashed, killing everyone on board. A Volgo AviaExpress TU-134 crashed the same day near Tula. Authorities are suspecting terrorist action behind both crashes.

The air disasters were followed by blasts at Moscow railway stations suspected to have been set off by Chechen women.

The Beslan school hostage drama was similar to the hostage-taking at Nord-Oust theatre in Moscow in 2002. Russian forces ended that crisis by releasing debilitating gas into the theatre building. But the gas also caused most of the 129 casualties.

During the first of two wars in Chechnya in 1995 rebels led by guerrilla commander Shamil Basayev seized a hospital in the southern Russian city Budyonnovsk, taking some 2,000 people hostage. The six-day standoff ended with a Russian assault in which about 100 people died.

Russia seeks to maintain a firm grip on Chechnya by ensuring that its ruler remains a Kremlin candidate. Alu Alkhanov, the only candidate backed by the Kremlin, was declared winner in presidential elections in Chechnya Aug. 29, with about 74 percent of the vote.

Alkhonov, former head of the local interior ministry was handpicked by President Putin after Alkhonov’s predecessor Akhmad Kadyrov was killed in a bomb attack May 9.

“The Kremlin has a tight grip on Chechnya without satisfying the rebels’ interests,” Moscow-based analyst Rustam Kaliyev told IPS. “The elections have also come under criticism. And the separatists have been angered to the point that they can only get through to the authorities by barbaric hostages and plane hijacks.”

Deputy prosecutor Sergey Fridinsky has said that the motive behind the attack is clear. “The militants’ demands were aimed at putting pressure on the authorities,” he said. “But the authorities will not accept such demands under any circumstances, and everything will be done to crush such terrorist moves.”

Putin has urged caution in responding to the crisis. “One of the goals of the terrorists was to sow ethnic enmity,” he said. “Anyone who gives in to such a provocation will be seen by us as abetting terrorism.”

Federal security chief for the region Valery Andreyev has said 10 Arabs were among about 30 militants killed. The Arab presence would support Putin’s contention that al-Qaeda terrorists are deeply involved in the Chechen conflict.

New evidence suggests that the attack had been planned long earlier. Andreyev said investigators were looking at the possibility that militants had smuggled in explosives into the school building during renovation this summer.

Sergey Karaganov, chairman of the independent Council of Foreign and Defence Policy in Russia told IPS Saturday that the tragedy was the result also of poor organisation of law enforcement agencies and security services.

“There are many of our officers who have not been trained for national security tasks,” he said. “The network has to be made stronger in order to prevent terrorist attacks against sensitive and strategic spots in the country.”

Karaganov called for structural changes within Russia and a new global coalition to fight terrorism.