<<all of this is blatant lie or at least semitruth and a result of total brainwashing from your so-called "free media">>
That’s what is said in the Russian media, which are under tight grip by Putin and his gov’t. In fact, if you bother with finding access to information which is not controlled by Putin, you would find that a lot of Russian atrocities against civil population in Chechnya are very well documented, down to dates, names and ranks of those responsible, photos, witness accounts etc. Politkovskaya excelled in this kind of investigative/documentative journalism and that’s most probably the reason she was murdered (by a macabre coincidence on Putin’s birthday). If you really look into her (and other) accounts, I don’t think you would dismiss them with the propaganda statement you’ve written above.
Despite extreme harassment and obstruction by the Russian and Kadyrov authorities (just imagine what could happen to a Chechen civilian complaining to Strasburg), some cases of Chechen claimants start to find the way to the European Court of Human Rights. Materials of those few cases do reveal really gruesome details, too. Sadly, Russia blocked a recent attempt at reforming the ECHR and in such a way it could effectively block many such proceedings.
Do you think that all media outside Putin’s control which report on those subjects are “brainwashed”? It would be a good result indeed….
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I don’t justify terrorists like Shamil Basayev and others of his kind. However, why did Russian special forces kill several of more moderate Chechen leaders like Dzohar Dudayev and lastly Aslan Maskhadov, who was the last trying seriously to reach a peace agreement? And why was Basayev tolerated for so many years? There are convincing accounts that at several occasions the Russian special forces simply looked the other way when they had an occasion to catch or kill him. He was very useful as an enemy, a “bloody fanatic even much worse than SS” to scare the Russians into supporting a strong leader who promised to “get the terrorists even in the loo”. To what extent were those Chechen terrorists created and nurtured by the Russian authorities or at least parts of them?
<<a) is it good for you if someone take kids or civilians in the theatre as the hostages or blast the passenger jet or metro train, in order to gain the independence or whatever else? b) don't you think that the victims were the direct consequence from the terrorist attack, not vice versa (i.e. no attack - no victims)? >>
Terrorism is terrorism and could never be justified, the answer is simple. But in any other country the leadership would negotiate with the terrorists, even realize some of their demands, and then pursue them after the hostages are safe. Any attempt to liberate the hostages by force would be a really surgical hit. Instead, the Russian special forces’ operation either in Beslan and Dubrovka consisted in killing the terrorists and hostages altogether. The authorities acted in the way like the fate of the hostages were totally unimportant for them.
Try to answer some other questions:
- why were the terrorists let to travel into Beslan through roads which would normally be covered by several army and police checkpoints, despite a great risk of terrorist attack in that area and in that particular time (schools’ opening)?
- why were some serious attempts to mediate hindered by the Russian special forces or authorities? Politkovskaya was seriously poisoned on the plane while travelling to Beslan to mediate. Maskhadov was refused safe passage and his mediation offer was declined. The only serious negotiator was Ruslan Aushev, whose efforts were much more difficult to hinder because of his high popularity as a distinguished officer and former President of North Ossetia.
- why did the Russian authorities refuse to identify the gas used in the attack by special forces on Dubrovka theater? Several hostages died a slow death while the doctors were unable to treat them.
- why are the families of Nord-Ost and Beslan victims trying to investigate the truth about the attacks (like “Mothers of Beslan” association, see http://www.materibeslana.com/rus/; http://www.pravdabeslana.ru/) harassed in the courts and deprived coverage by the mainstream Russian media?
Finally, in other cases there are proofs that the Russian “siloviki“ did not hesitate to orchestrate terrorist attacks themselves in order to blame them on Chechens and justify Putin’s grip on power. There is credible evidence that the 1999 attacks on residential blocks throughout Russia were perpetrated not by Chechens but by Russian special forces. You can find details i.a. in a film by Andrei Nekrasov, available on youtube.
I bothered writing such a long answer because I’ve looked on your website and seen you are a mountaineer, apparently not a crazy chauvinist blinded with hate, as your first post might have suggested – so perhaps you could be open to arguments which don’t reflect what is said in Russian TV.
