- (AP) -- The Chechen rebel leader, Shamil Basayev, today
claimed responsibility for a string of recent terrorist attacks in Russia,
including the Beslan school siege, according to a Chechen news website.
In a letter published by the Kavkaz Centre, Mr Basayev said he had written
to the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, proposing "independence
... in exchange for security". He also blamed Mr Putin for the deaths
of more than 300 people at Beslan, accusing him of ordering the school
to be stormed for "imperial reasons".
-
- The letter, signed with his nom de guerre, Abdallakh
Shamil, Emir of the Riyadus Salikhin Martyrs' Brigade, could not be independently
verified as genuine but the site is considered a mouthpiece for Mr Basayev,
and his previous claims of responsibility have appeared there.
-
- He said that if Russia withdrew its troops and recognised
Chechen independence, Chechnya would neither support nor finance groups
fighting Russia, and: "We can guarantee that all of Russia's Muslims
would refrain from armed methods of struggle against the Russian federation,
at least for 10-15 years, on condition that freedom of religion (as is
guaranteed in the Russian federation) be respected."
-
- He said Chechnya would join the Commonwealth of Independent
States, a loose federation of former Soviet republics.
-
- He said his fighters were responsible for an August explosion
at a bus stop outside Moscow, the near-simultaneous bombings of two planes
the same night, a suicide bombing outside a Moscow underground station
a week later and the school hostage-taking in Beslan, which ended in a
hail of gunfire and explosions.
-
- "A terrible tragedy occurred in the city of Beslan.
The Kremlin vampire destroyed and wounded 1,000 children and adults, giving
the ordering to storm the school for the sake of imperial ambitions and
the preservation of his own throne," Mr Basayev wrote.
-
- President Putin and other officials said repeatedly that
in order to avert a bloodbath they had not planned to storm the school,
where the attackers had rigged bombs around the hostages. According to
Russian officials and witnesses, the special forces were forced to attack
after explosions rocked the school.
-
- But Mr Basayev disputed the official version of events,
saying: "We declare that the Russian special services stormed the
school ... it was planned from the very beginning."
-
- He said the attackers' demands had been clear: an immediate
stop to the war in Chechnya and a start to the withdrawal of Russian troops
or Mr Putin's resignation if he "does not want peace".
-
- Mr Putin has firmly ruled out any negotiations with Chechen
rebels, insisting that the war-battered region is becoming more stable
under the Kremlin's programme of investing greater authority in elected
Chechen officials and security reforms.
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- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2004
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- http://www.guardian.co.uk/chechnya/Story/0,2763,1306818,00.html
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