Torshin

At chechnya-sl, Marius has translated part of a recent interview with Alexander Torshin, head of the Beslan commission of inquiry:

There is evidence from the only terrorist who was taken alive, Nurpasaha Kulayev. According to him, the "Colonel" (Khuchbarov) announced them, that Beslan - that was Maskhadov-Basaev's order. The commission has all grounds to consider that precisely they were the organizers of this terrorist act. Basayev took responsibility upon himself..

- Do you confirm authenticity of Basayev's letter?

- There's no final conclusion of graphological examination as yet. This case is complicated, especially in the absence of the suspect. Is increasingly more-less clear with the organizers. To find those who had ordered it...

- Any assumptions - who are they?

- Let's not give play to imagination. All this mystery will become sooner or later overt, and we compulsorily will find them. But that, that Maskhadov with Basayev [zakashchiki] aren't those who had ordered it - is accurate.

Let us wait for the results of examination of Abu-Dzeit and Maskhadov's archives. There are in the world forces for which it is profitable to rekindle a new Caucasian war.

The Beslan terrorist act - it's multi-vector and multipurpose. For example, the fighters attained that the relations between North Ossetia and Ingushetia, putting it mildly, hasn't warmed up. And a point of junction - that what they found: two religions, two nations, children, complex situation in the whole North Caucasus, indecision on the territorial problems, tension on the border with Georgia - simply a more vulnerable point for the act of terror cannot be found.

It was well planned. And it was executed by the well trained fighters,who knew how to fight , who knew what to do. They considered all lessons of the "Nord -Ost" - they broke glass, took gas masks with them, they didn't conducted any negotations, but immediately began to kill, after being pin down by activity of our special services.

- Did the commission discover a "Georgian trace" of the Beslan events, about which they talked a lot in Beslan?

- Certainly, this theory will be exaggerated. There are still unidentified corpses of the bandits. However, we haven't discovered the "Georgian trace". Although there were signals that it was existing, and we checked it out.

[passage omitted]