Russia given break on ChechnyaMOSCOW - The international community largely abandoned its criticism
of Russia's campaign in Chechnya after the Sept. 11 terrorist strikes
on the United States and Russia is grateful, the head of Russian
President Vladimir Putin's security council said Thursday.
"I must say that the leaders of very many countries have changed their
attitude to the developments in Chechnya, especially after the world
realized the importance of combating international terrorism,"
Security Council chief Vladimir Rushailo said, according to the news
agency Interfax.
"Many are departing from double standards in assessing the
terrorists," Rushailo said. "It is a serious change that we assess
very positively." Putin's strong support for the anti-terror campaign
and his claim that Russia is engaged in a similar battle in the small,
southern republic of Chechnya have profoundly changed Western
attitudes, analysts have said.
The United States, enjoying a new thaw in relations with Moscow, has
endorsed Putin's allegations of ties between the Chechen rebels and
Osama bin Laden, the main suspect in the U.S. terror attacks. Western
concerns about alleged human rights abuses by Russian troops in
Chechnya are currently overshadowed by praise for Moscow's close
cooperation with the international coalition against terror.
"The rebels and mercenaries fighting in Chechnya now find it extremely
difficult to complain to the international community about the federal
authorities' illegal actions," Rushailo said.
The war in Chechnya has been locked in a bloody stalemate for more
than a year: Russian forces have not fulfilled Putin's 1999 vow to
crush the rebels, and the insurgents kill Russian soldiers and
pro-Moscow Chechen officials in small-scale ambushes and mine blasts
almost every day.
Putin, who built his popularity in part by taking a tough stance on
Chechnya, had repeatedly rejected Western calls for a negotiated
settlement of the latest war there. But after Sept. 11, he urged
Chechen rebels to discuss disarming and abandoning their separatist
fight.
The first face-to-face talks were held Sunday, but Putin's envoy said
they were largely unproductive and future talks would be conditioned
on the rebels providing "practical answers" to Putin's call for them
to lay down their arms.
"Talks can be conducted only about full discontinuation of combat
operations and the surrender of weapons by gunmen," Rushailo said,
according to the ITAR-Tass news agency.
Russia withdrew its forces from Chechnya in 1996 after a 20-month war,
leaving the crime-plagued republic de facto independent. Russian
forces returned in fall 1999, after Chechnya-based rebels raided a
neighboring Russian region and after apartment-house bombings that
officials blamed on rebels.
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