Chechnya Weekly

Jamestown Foundation

http://www.jamestown.org


September 15, 2005 - Volume VI, Issue 33


IN THIS ISSUE:
* Shepel and Beslan Mothers Exchange Accusations
* Kolesnikov Raps North Ossetian Officials
* Sadulaev Explains His Relations With Basaev
* General Lists Successes But Grenades Hit the Interior Ministry
* Gunmen Also Busy in Dagestan
* Bombs Set Off in Ingushetia
* Briefs
* From Chechnya to Dagestan: Basaev's Second Front Against Russia
By Andrei Smirnov





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SHEPEL AND BESLAN MOTHERS EXCHANGE ACCUSATIONS

Deputy Prosecutor General Nikolai Shepel on September 13 accused residents of Beslan who testified at the trial of Nurpashi Kulaev, the sole living Beslan hostage-taker to be put on trial, of lying. Shepel, a member of the team of prosecutors headed by Deputy Prosecutor General Vladimir Kolesnikov that President Vladimir Putin ordered to re-investigate the September 2004 tragedy, told Itar-Tass that in the re-investigation process, "a new pattern is observed—some of the witnesses are giving evidence based not on their own observations, but on the basis of the publications of certain respected national and regional media, [and] rumors." Shepel said that as part of the criminal probe into Beslan, investigators have checked all media items containing information about the hostage seizure and that a number of journalists have given them "invaluable assistance." On the other hand, there have been publications based "on rumors, unchecked information and fantasies of the authors themselves," he said, citing specifically the claim—made by eyewitnesses and reported in various media—that more than 32 hostage-takers were involved in the Beslan raid.

Besides raising doubts about the official estimate of the number of hostage-takers, former hostages have stated during testimony at the Kulaev trial that the first explosion in the school, which triggered other blasts and the bloody assault by security forces, came from outside, and that the security forces fired on the school with heavy weapons, including tanks and flame-throwers.

Members of the Beslan Mothers' Committee denounced Shepel's comments. The group's head, Susanna Dudieva, told Ekho Moskvy radio that it was "frivolous" and "irresponsible" for Shepel to "agitate" the people in this way. "Our children were killed by this frivolousness and irresponsibility," she said. "We will not allow things to continue in this direction. We will raise the question of Shepel's removal." Another member of the committee, Ella Kesaeva, told Kavkazky Uzel: "We no longer believe anybody—neither the president nor Shepel nor Kolesnikov…. The whole town was at the school a year ago, and now the whole town is being accused of bearing false witness…. It turns out, that the president deceived our representatives, promising on September 2 to look into everything." Kesaeva added that "we can no longer remain silent. We understand we cannot do much—for example, we are now preparing a written appeal demanding Nikolai Shepel's resignation. We understand that the authorities will not punish themselves….But it is impossible to remain silent, it is impossible to tolerate such an insolent lie; the entire world community must know what is going on here, how justice is being replaced."

The Beslan Mothers' Committee was also harshly critical of comments made by Nikolai Shepel on the anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, when he claimed that the evidence shows that the Beslan raid was the work of international terrorists. According to Itar-Tass, Shepel said that this evidence includes a videocassette showing a recorded "instruction session" held for a group called the "Jamaat Caliphate," which, he claimed, carried out the attack on Beslan's School No. 1. The Beslan attack, he said, was coordinated by Abu Zeit, the Arab warlord reportedly killed in February of this year, and Chechen rebel warlord Shamil Basaev. Shepel also claimed that investigators have testimony from rebel gunmen who say that the late rebel leader Aslan Maskhadov personally briefed the group that carried out the Beslan raid.

Responding to Shepel's claim that Beslan was an act of international terrorism, Ella Kesaeva told Ekho Moskvy on September 11 that "the prosecutor, like us, knows the ethnic composition of the gang" that carried out the Beslan raid—an apparent reference to the fact that the hostage takers were mainly Ingush, along with several Chechens. "That statement speaks once again to the fact that the official investigation in every way possible is strenuously covering up those crimes that were committed in Beslan's School No. 1 during the storming, when children were burned up by Shmel [incendiary rocket grenades] and shot by tanks and flamethrowers. No one is responsible for international terrorism." Kesaeva also said that Shepel's comments showed that President Putin's September 2 meeting with the Beslan Mothers' Committee representatives, in which he promised there would be an objective investigation, had "yielded no results whatever."

KOLESNIKOV RAPS NORTH OSSETIAN OFFICIALS

Deputy Prosecutor General Vladimir Kolesnikov, meanwhile, accused North Ossetian President Taymuraz Mamsurov and the head of the republic's parliamentary commission investigating the Beslan tragedy, Stanislav Kesaev, of being unwilling to cooperate with federal investigators. During a September 7 press conference in Vladikavkaz, Kolesnikov claimed that Mamsurov—whose children were among the Beslan hostages and who was part of the delegation that met with Putin on September 2—had been summoned for questioning but that neither he nor "a number of other high-ranking officials" had yet been questioned, Itar-Tass reported. "I cannot explain this behavior," Kolesnikov said. "One is getting the impression that somebody is not interested in learning the truth." He also claimed that Kesaev had refused to answer investigators' questions in November 2004 and would be summoned for questioning a second time. "He refuses to answer the investigators' questions and name his information sources," Kolesnikov said of Kesaev. "The setting up of a republican parliamentary commission is not an end in itself." Kesaev, it should be noted, has publicly questioned various aspects of the official version of the Beslan hostage seizure (see Chechnya Weekly, September 7, June 30).

Kommersant on September 8 quoted Kesaev as insisting that he was not refusing to cooperate with federal investigators. "We will certainly talk with the Kolesnikov group because this cooperation suits interests of society—but not until we have found a form of work acceptable for all the sides," he told the newspaper. "Article 15 of the law on general principles for organizing state power in the Russian Federation subjects says that a deputy is allowed not to disclose information he obtained as a result his official activity. Therefore, I do not wish to cooperate with General Prosecutor's Office representatives as a witness, but am ready to provide the information." A spokeswoman for Mamsurov said he had received a letter from the Prosecutor General's Office inviting him for an interrogation on September 7 at any time of his convenience. "Taymuraz Mamsurov is interested in an objective investigation," the spokeswoman said. "He came back from Moscow specially for a meeting with the deputy general prosecutor. His airplane landed at [2 PM local time] but Mamsurov did not make it to the prosecutor's office—Vladimir Kolesnikov had already issued his statement by that time."

Mamsurov submitted to five hours of questioning by Prosecutor General's Office investigators on September 9. In an interview with Izvestia published on September 12, he said: "Since the tragedy I have been invited to Moscow just once to attend the Torshin commission [the Russian parliamentary commission investigating Beslan headed by Federation Council vice speaker Aleksandr Torshin]. I gave all my evidence there. Since then no one has been interested in my opinion, including the Prosecutor General's Office."

On September 9, North Ossetia's legislature sent a letter to Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov demanding that Kolesnikov apologize for the remarks he made about the local authorities' inability to solve the Beslan hostage case, RIA Novosti reported. The parliamentary deputies also said that Deputy Prosecutor General Nikolai Shepel had insultingly reprimanded Kesaev and his republican investigative commission. "We are seeking an unbiased investigation into the causes and circumstances of the terrorist attack…and to determine the fault of officials, irrespective of their positions and previous services to the country," the letter stated. "However, we believe groundless pressure is unacceptable and goes beyond Russian senior officials' authority."

Kesaev went in for questioning by the Vladikavkaz prosecutor's office on September 12, Interfax reported. "The questioning proceeded normally," Kesaev told journalists afterwards. "It met all procedural norms and I said everything I wanted to say. I have always said that I am not refusing to cooperate with the Prosecutor General's Office. I was invited as a witness in, what is most important, that major criminal case [the overall Beslan criminal case], not the Kulaev case. I refused to give testimony in Kulaev's case. I found it possible to provide the commission with numerous materials. I hope it will help the Prosecutor General's Office establish the truth."

The columnist Yulia Latynina suggested in her Moscow Times column published on September 14 that in attacking the North Ossetian authorities, the federal authorities are trying to drive a wedge between them and the Beslan Mothers' Committee and pressure them to shut the mothers up. "It looks like the Kremlin is now playing off two sides against each other in a simple game," Latynina wrote. "The new investigators [Kolesnikov, Shepel et al] will be very loyal to the Beslan mothers. At the same time, they will put as much pressure as possible on Mamsurov and his people to get the mothers to shut up. They will drive a wedge between the Beslan mothers and the North Ossetian government."

Meanwhile, Vadim Rechkalov wrote in Moskovsky komsomolets on September 14 that following the storming of Beslan's School No. 1 on September 3, 2004, he had managed to talk to an Emergency Situations Ministry (MChS) staffer who had been on the scene. The exchange of fire that led to the assault on the school by security forces began, Rechkalov recalled, when four MChS staffers went into the school to retrieve the bodies of hostages who had been killed when the terrorists first seized the school. Rechkalov quoted the MChS staffer as having told him: "We drove up in a truck, open the doors, opened the sides, showed that they were empty, carried the body of one [hostage taker] onto the steps—they themselves were afraid to take it from an open spot. And then a doctor went with them around the corner, and we remained standing at the fence with our arms in the air. And then shooting started. There was no explosion preceding it. After someone opened fire, the [hostage takers] began to shoot at us. If no one had started shooting, everything would have been okay. We had an understanding with the [hostage takers]. We were absolutely sure we would return." The MChS staffer told Rechkalov that going to retrieve the bodies "was simply a set-up"—that is, that the security forces used the MChS staffers' mission to collect bodies as a diversionary tactic for initiating a shootout and then an assault on the school. Two of the MChS staffers were killed in the shooting.

SADULAEV EXPLAINS HIS RELATIONS WITH BASAEV

Chechen rebel leader Abdul-Khalim Sadulaev gave an interview to Gazeta Wyborcza that the Polish newspaper published on September 9. The separatist Kavkazcenter website published a Russian translation of that interview on September 13.

Among other things, Sadulaev was asked whether the rebels' war is a "liberation" struggle or a "jihad," given that they are now led by a religious figure—meaning Sadulaev himself. He replied that it is a "defensive jihad," meaning a "defense of the homeland from an invasion by an external enemy, the liberation of our motherland from occupiers and the establishment of genuine freedom on our land." He added that the Chechen war could be described both as a "jihad" and a "liberation war."

Noting that Aslan Maskhadov had constantly offered to sit down for negotiations with the Russian authorities, the interviewer asked Sadulaev whether he would do the same. Sadulaev responded that Maskhadov indeed "offered the path of peace, although he also saw that the enemy constantly rejected his peace initiatives." Sadulaev added: "The paths to peace that Maskhadov offered, we also adhere to, and I am of that opinion. But there is one ‘but:' I am not a supporter of constantly offering peace. Because the Russians will not be inclined toward peace as long as they don't have a need for it. And I am not prepared to offer peace to the Russians all the time for no particular reason, in order to play up to them. I repeat once again that we are not planning to turn away from the path of peace that Aslan offered; we have not changed our opinion on that account. We simply are not prepared to appeal to Russia for peace all the time. We have already let the Russians know that peace is possible here at any time, and that this peace depends upon them. But I do not intend to ask them for this any more."

Sadulaev was asked about his relations with Shamil Basaev. It should be noted that Sadulaev issued a decree last month naming his cabinet, in which he named himself as prime minister and Basaev as first deputy prime minister. Basaev was given responsibility for the "power" agencies, including the National Security Service, the Anti-terrorist Center and the Interior Ministry.

Sadulaev told Gazeta Wyborcza that he "always had and always will have friendly, good relations with Shamil Basaev," but added that there is one issue about which they have disagreed going back to the period before Maskhadov's death. "It is that Shamil does not rule out taking hostages when conducting special operations or sabotage actions. Official Dzhokhar (former Grozny) does not accept such methods of conducting war. The ChRI [Chechen Republic of Ichkeria] leadership does not see any benefit in that and thinks that it does not contribute to the attainment of peace." At the same time, Sadulaev argued, given that "the leadership of Russia, beginning with its president, has turned hostage-taking into official state policy" in the North Caucasus and given the overall "cruelty of our historical enemy…no one can forbid (Shamil Basaev) from manifesting a corresponding reciprocal reaction—neither the President of Chechnya nor the Emir of the GKO [State Defense Committee]—Madzhlisul Shura. The only thing that can be undertaken here is to have a personal principled assessment. But as chief and subordinate, as mujahid to mujahid, we have good mutual relations. On the remaining matters he fulfills all the duties he is entrusted with, and rather successfully…. When Shamil wants to answer the Russians in kind, we don't find a way to punish him, we don't see in the Sharia any prohibition, so as to stop him. We can only advise Shamil: ‘We don't think that anything good will come out of what you are doing; please, don't do it.'" Sadulaev also quoted a verse from the Koran stating that aggression can be met with aggression.

Asked whether Basaev's actions damage the reputation of the Chechen resistance, Sadulaev answered: "One cannot react to the activity of Shamil unambiguously. Shamil Basaev is the head of the top committee in the GKO-Madzhlisul Shura—the Military Committee. He coordinates with the commanders of the fronts and sectors the missions to strike blows against the occupiers and national-traitors. And we are very happy with those operations, and also the activity of Shamil and his emirs. It does not demolish the image of the Chechens. And we only differ in our opinions concerning the taking of hostages; the ChRI leadership does not approve of that."

On August 30, following Basaev's elevation to the post first deputy foreign minister in the separatist government, Agence France-Presse quoted Ousman Fersauli, the Chechen rebel official living in exile in Denmark who is the new separatist government's foreign minister, as telling the Danish daily Politiken that the international community "should be happy that Basaev has been included in the government, since this means we have him under control." Within the new government, Basaev "is just a soldier who must obey," he said. "And if he doesn't he will be arrested, and I am convinced that he will not commit other terrorist acts." Fersauli said he was opposed to terrorist acts like the ones Basaev has claimed responsibility for, but that serving in the same government as Basaev did not compromise his convictions. "No, this will not change our stance," he said. "Basaev will not get involved in foreign policy. It will be up to me and Akhmed Zakaev to take responsibility for that." Zakaev, who is exile in London, was named culture minister in the new separatist government. Danish Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller, meanwhile, said he deemed it "unacceptable" that Basaev had been included in the Chechen rebel government.

Meanwhile, Chechen First Deputy Prime Minister Ramzan Kadyrov told Interfax on September 14 that Abdul-Khalim Sadulaev's deputy, Shamil-Khadzhi Muskiev, had been killed along with four other rebels in a battle with law enforcement officers in the city of Argun. Kadyrov claimed that Muskiev was "the main ideologue of the illegal armed formations—the right hand of Sadulaev," and that Muskiev was directly responsible for the murder around 90 people in the village of Tsatsan-Yurt in the Kurchaloi district. Chechen Interior Minister Ruslan Alkhanov told Itar-Tass there were losses among the law enforcement personnel in the Argun battle, but gave no numbers. The Russian-Chechen Friendship Society (ORChD) reported that two policemen were killed in the battled, while Radio Liberty reported that three policemen were killed, including the commander of Argun's special police group.

GENERAL LISTS SUCCESSES BUT GRENADES HIT THE INTERIOR MINISTRY

Col.-Gen. Arkady Yedelev, chief of the regional headquarters for counter-terrorist operations in the North Caucasus, told Interfax on September 12 that a total 231 rebel fighters had been eliminated and 890 rebels suspected of crimes arrested in sweep operations in Chechnya during the first eight months of this year. "Six high-ranking leaders, 13 militant group leaders and 23 emirs were among those eliminated," he said.
"Fifteen guerrilla leaders and 11 emirs have been detained since the beginning of the year." Commenting on security measures that are being taken in Chechnya ahead of parliamentary elections in the republic, set for November, Yedelev said: "The situation within the Chechen republic is favorable for parliamentary elections. It is under the total control of federal forces, the authorities of the Chechen republic and local law-enforcement agencies. We have no doubts that the elections will be prepared and will proceed in a calm atmosphere."

Meanwhile, thirteen people were wounded on September 13 when unknown attackers fired on the Chechen Interior Ministry building in Grozny with a grenade launcher. A republican law-enforcement source told Itar-Tass that nine police officers and civilians, including a woman, were among the injured, but that none of their lives were in danger. According to the news agency, it is believed that one person or several people fired on the building with a grenade launcher from a distance of approximately 1,500 meters away.

Interfax reported on September 13 that two police officers were killed and one wounded in a blast in Grozny. Quoting the Chechen Interior Ministry, the news agency reported that a police car ferrying an unidentified criminal suspect from the Grozny remand prison to the police station in Chechnya's Naursky district hit an explosive device and that the blast killed the deputy head of Naursky district police station's detention center and the policeman who was driving the vehicle. The third police officer and the detained suspect were wounded. Earlier on September 13, Chechen law enforcement sources told Interfax that the dead bodies of a police patrolman and an unemployed local woman had been found in an abandoned car in Grozny's Staropromyslovsky district the previous day.

GUNMEN ALSO BUSY IN DAGESTAN

Unknown attackers fired on a police checkpoint on the southwestern outskirts of the Dagestani city of Buinaksk in the early hours of the September 13, killing one officer, Lt. Niyaz Gasanov, and wounding another. In the incident, which took place near a tuberculosis hospital, the gunmen fired from a nearby forest simultaneously from three points. Another attack on police took place in the village of Geli, in Dagestan's Karabudakhkentsky district, on the evening of September 11, when unknown gunmen traveling in a Niva automobile opened fire on a police post. The police fired back, killing one of the attackers, and the car turned over. When police tried to capture the second attacker, he blew himself up with a grenade. A Dagestani Interior Ministry told Kavkazky Uzel that the Niva used in the attack had been identified as having been used in attacks in which policemen were killed. A source in the Karabudakhkentsky district police department told the website that a second car was involved in the attack and that those driving in it managed to escape.

Kavkazky Uzel cited other sources as saying that the attackers in this incident had been involved in the September 6 shooting murder of three members of the Kayakentsky district police department on the Kavkaz federal highway (see Chechnya Weekly, September 7). In a statement that Kavkazcenter website posted on September 10, the Sharia Jamaat claimed responsibility for that attack and others, including the bomb blast in Makhachkala on September 2 that killed two servicemen from the 102nd brigade of Interior Ministry troops. Referring to reports that the bombing also killed three civilians, the Islamist group said that if those reports were true, they were "accidental victims" because its "mujahideen" had not seen civilians moving near "the occupation forces." The Sharia Jamaat statement continued: "Responsibility for the deaths of these people lies fully with Rusnya [a derogatory term for Russia-CW] and their Dagestani accomplices and lackeys who have been occupying the Islamic lands of Dagestan and the Caucasus and have unleashed a war against the religion of God and the Muslims here. We have warned the peaceful population of Dagestan on more than one occasion not to go near the occupation forces and the members of the so-called ‘Interior Ministry, FSB and Prosecutor's Office,' places where they gather, their deployment and patrol areas, transport and premises. Be vigilant, because they always try to stay close to the peaceful population and to use them as a shield." The Sharia Jamaat referred to itself as "the legitimate authority of Dagestan."

On September 12, Dagestani Interior Minister Adilgerei Magomedtagirov held a press conference to report on the republic's successes in fighting terrorism. He said that during the previous two-and-a-half months, 50 members of an "illegal armed formation" had been captured and 37 killed and that the "main leaders" of the "criminal groups" had been destroyed. According to Magomedtagirov, two suspected rebels, Kazim Radzhabov and Temirbulat Zubairov, were captured on September 9 in Makhachkala along with a homemade bomb, bomb components, and several grenades. The two suspects, he said, had been involved in various terrorist attacks, including the September 2 bombing in Makhachkala. "Up to four clandestine bandit groups are currently acting in the republic," Magomedtagirov told reporters. "They call themselves the Sharia group. According to information available to us, the total number of the bandits is up to 30 people. They are operating mainly in the cities Makhachkala, Khasavyurt and Buinaksk."

Dagestani State Council Chairman Magomedali Magomedov, for his part, painted a somewhat less rosy picture of the fight against the rebels, telling a meeting of Dagestan's Security Council on September 8 that "in many directions, the results of the fight against crime, and especially terrorism, have deteriorated." He claimed that terrorists have increased their activity because they are getting help from abroad. "Many connect the worsening crime situation and the rise of terrorist activity in Dagestan with the upcoming presidential elections, but, as reports of law enforcement structures' heads indicate, the rise in terrorist activity is related to the fact that they are being supported by certain forces based outside the republic and the country," Interfax quoted him as saying.

Meanwhile, Interfax reported on September 12 that a serviceman had been killed on September 11 when a shootout took place between members of the Interior Ministry's 102nd brigade and Chechen policemen on the Kharami Pass that links Dagestan's Botlikhsky district and Chechnya's Vedeno district. "Under the conditions of poor visibility they apparently didn't make out who is who and got into a firefight," a source told the news agency. A Chechen policeman was wounded in the shootout.

BOMBS SET OFF IN INGUSHETIA

An explosive device detonated on the side of the Kavkaz federal highway in Ingushetia's main city, Nazran, on September 14, Itar-Tass reported. The blast occurred as a UAZ vehicle carrying officers from the Ingushetian Interior Ministry's patrol and checkpoint service was passing by. The ministry said there were no casualties and the vehicle sustained only slight damage. The blast, however, left a crater two meters across and 60 centimeters deep. Also on September 14, ingushetiya.ru reported that a base station of the mobile phone operator Beeline had been blown up in the Nazran district village of Surkhakhi. According to the website, Beeline had just started to operate in Ingushetia and the explosion "postponed the appearance of a new cellular competitor in the republic." On September 6, an antenna belonging to Megafon, which controls practically the entire cellular phone market in Ingushetia, was blown up.

Two makeshift roadside bombs went off in the Ingushetian city of Malgobek on September 10, injuring a police officer who was driving by on his way to work, Reuters reported. Just hours later, an explosive device blew up near a pipeline transporting gas from North Ossetia to Georgia, but did not damage it. A local emergencies ministry spokesman said the blast occurred on Ingushetia's border with North Ossetia, but noted that gas supplies were not interrupted. The pipeline has been the target of a number of attacks in the past. On September 9, police personnel defused a homemade explosive device that was discovered on the outskirts of the Nazran district settlement of Barsuki. Ingushetian Interior Ministry sources told Kavkazky Uzel that the device was made from two 120-millimeter artillery shells and a radio-controlled detonator.

BRIEFS

--RUSSIA WANTS U.N. SANCTIONS AGAINST EXILED CHECHEN REBELS
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mikhail Kamynin told Interfax on September 9 that Russia views the UN Security Council's anti-terrorist list as incomplete and wants Chechen extremists who have committed crimes against Russian citizens to be added. "Unfortunately, the ‘anti-terrorist' list does not yet include the names of certain people who have committed crimes against Russians," he said. "To our surprise, they feel quite comfortable in individual Western countries and continue to take steps to destabilize the situation in Chechnya and the entire North Caucasus, collect funds and recruit mercenaries for a ‘dirty' war against the Chechen people and Russia as a whole. Moscow is not quite satisfied with this list because it is far from being full and includes only al-Qaeda, the Taliban movement and related organizations." Russia, Kamynin said, favors a more extensive list of such organizations and wants sanctions to be imposed on them and their financial flows to be cut off. An initiative to compile such a list was put forward in U.N. Security Council Resolution 1566, which was adopted after last year's Beslan hostage crisis. On September 8, the Russian president's special representative for international cooperation in the fight against terrorism and organized crime, Anatoly Safonov, said Russia would do everything within its power to secure the extradition of Akhmad Zakaev and Ilyas Akhmadov.

--ALKHANOV: EX-REBELS WELCOME TO RUN FOR PARLIAMENT
Chechen President Alu Alkhanov said on September 11 that former rebels would be allowed to run in the republic's parliamentary elections, set for November 27. "If a candidate…is not located in an institution of confinement and if the necessary number of constituents vote for him, he will become a [parliamentary] deputy," Alkhanov told Interfax. "According to our information, both deputies from the former, so-called parliament of Ichkeria and people who held various posts in the governments of Maskhadov and Dudaev plan to put forward their candidacies." He also said "persons who yielded to false ideals and in different times wound up in the ranks of the illegal armed formations, but, without having committed crimes, managed to return in time to civilian life, and who the law-enforcement organs have no claims on, also will be able to take part in the election as candidates." He added that the government is "prepared to accept observers from any international organizations." On September 12, Alkhanov reported that he had invited the Council of Europe to send observers to the elections, Itar-Tass reported.

--CHECHEN REFUGEES IN GEORGIA PROTEST HARASSMENT
The London-based Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR) reported on September 10 that the remaining 2,000 Chechen refugees of the 7,000 that originally fled to Georgia's Pankisi Gorge after Russia launched its second military operation in Chechnya in 1999 complain of "constant harassment" by Georgian police. More than 100 Chechen refugees have been picketing the entrance to Duisi, the administrative center of Pankisi, for a third consecutive week. They are refusing to sign the annual round of documentation that registers them as refugees in Georgia, and are threatening to go on a hunger strike unless the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the Tbilisi government act on their complaints. One of the protesters, Vakha Arsanukaev told IWPR: "For six years, we have been living in constant fear. Our rights are being violated all the time and nothing is being done to solve our problems. This is not our first action. But this time, we refugees are not going to surrender until we achieve some result."


FROM CHECHNYA TO DAGESTAN: BASAEV'S SECOND FRONT AGAINST RUSSIA

By Andrei Smirnov

The situation in Dagestan continues to deteriorate. Despite the deployment of additional troops and police units from other Russian regions and a personal visit from President Putin, explosions and rebel attacks have only intensified in the province.

The majority of observers in Russia, as well as many in the West, usually explain the violence in Dagestan by citing the multi-ethnic structure of the population, power struggles between disparate clans, and the high level of corruption and unemployment.
This conventional view has become even more prevalent after a report by Dmitry Kozak, Putin's envoy to the Southern Federal District, was leaked to the press. As Moskovsky komsomolets reported in June, the report sharply criticized the authorities in the North Caucasian republics, especially the authorities of Dagestan, saying that "the North Caucasian leaders have separated themselves from the society and turned to a close cast which serves only its private interests. The corporative societies formed in organs of power in the Caucasus have monopolized political and economic resources. The system of balance is ruined and the result is the spread of corruption." The implication is clear: local governing elites are responsible for instability in the region. Russian commentators have wholeheartedly agreed with Kozak's conclusions, as well as the inevitable recommendations that any lasting solution to the province's problems lies in addressing economic depravity. If the local elite cared more about the wealth of ordinary people in Dagestan, the argument proceeds, then conflict in the region would be resolved.

Yet the economic and corruption issues mentioned in Kozak's report are not the only reasons for violence in Dagestan. The report absolutely ignored human rights violations committed by the police and Federal Security Service (FSB), such as torture and illegal detention. Similarly, the report fails to mentions the increasing popularity of radical Islam among young Dagestanis. If the problem was solely one of economic deprivation, what then explains the motives of very rich members of the Dagestani elite—"separated from society" as the report says—to join the rebels in the mountains? Dagestani rebel leaders include names from privileged elites, such as the son of the head of the administration of Gymry village (see EDM, November 03, 2004), a son of a cousin of the mayor of the city of Khasavyurt, and a brother of the head of the Khasavyurt branch of the state-owned natural gas company. Rebel leaders do not contain any Lezgin or Azerbaijani men, despite the lower socioeconomic status of such ethnic groups.

Nor does the report address the relations between Dagestan and Chechnya. The Chechen conflict has a major impact on the Dagestani conflict. On August 7, Abdul-Khalim Sadulaev, the leader of the Chechen separatist forces, met in the republic with commanders of rebel groups from different regions of the North Caucasus. As Chechenpress reported on August 9, "Sadulaev heard the reports from the commanders about how to provide all squads with everything needed for effective military and sabotage operations." There is no doubt that the increasing number of the rebel attacks in the eastern part of the North Caucasus (Ingushetia and Dagestan) followed Sadulaev's meeting. The deterioration of the entire regional situation results from of a coordinated strategy of both Chechen and Dagestani rebels.

In August 1999, Chechen warlord Shamil Basaev sought to establish a foothold in Russia and invaded two districts of Dagestan. Learning from those attacks, Basaev changed his policy toward Dagestan in favor of slow penetration rather than high profile invasion. The increasing dissatisfaction of the Dagestani populace with the corrupt, authoritarian regime of Magomedali Magomedov, the leader of the republic, and the illegal methods of the security officials, like torture and illegal detention, helped Chechen and Dagestani rebels gain social support throughout the region.

Starting in 2000, Basaev sought to build on this popular resentment and develop a comprehensive strategy of resistance. First, the rebels began to target local security structures to weaken the government. This campaign lasted four years and eliminated dozens of policemen and FSB officers who dealt with organized crime and religious extremism. As a result, Dagestani authorities were weakened, and the federal government could no longer rely on the local police to effectively confront the rebels. Meanwhile, the rebels spared the lives of terrified officers in exchange for help, building new support within the police ranks.

The rebels continued their campaign and captured main towns after attacking and bombing police patrols. This had so decimated and demoralized local police units that this summer the Kremlin sent more police and troops from Russia to stem the violence. These new units, however, just became additional targets for the rebels, and their presence in the republic could not improve the situation. The army started patrolling streets in Dagestan, but, by this time, the insurgency had become so well-armed and trained that it could directly fight the regular troops as well. Recently, there have been several bombings of military trucks, APCs, and attacks on army patrols throughout the republic. The rebels can easily move around the region, attacking checkpoints and patrols. The current situation in Dagestan—large-scale guerilla warfare—has escalated to the same level of violence that has existed in Chechnya for years.

Kozak's report ignored these developments, and for good reason: if it accurately analyzed and described the situation, the Kremlin would be to blame, not the leaders of the North Caucasian republics. This war in Dagestan, coordinated by Chechen militants, reflects the bankruptcy of Putin's Caucasian policy. Despite Kozak's report, Russian authorities are clearly aware of the real situation in Dagestan and also of the role of Chechen separatists. In fact, a source in Moscow told the Jamestown Foundation that a classified version of the report accurately predicted the recent increase in rebel activity (see EDM, February 9, 2005).

Andrei Smirnov is an independent journalist covering the North Caucasus, he is based in Russia.


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Chechnya Weekly is a publication of the Jamestown Foundation. Beginning January 2003 with Volume IV, Chechnya Weekly was researched and written by Lawrence A. Uzzell, a senior Jamestown Foundation fellow who opened Jamestown's Moscow office in 1992 and is President of International Religious Freedom Watch (formerly Keston USA). Volumes 1-3 [2000-2002] were researched and written by John B. Dunlop, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. The Jamestown Foundation and The American Committee for Peace in Chechnya cooperate to raise awareness about the crisis in Chechnya.

If you have any questions regarding the content of Chechnya Weekly, please email us at pubs@jamestown.org. You may contact the Foundation by phone at 202-483-8888, by fax at 202-483-8337, or by postal mail at The Jamestown Foundation, 4516 43rd Street NW, Washington, DC 20016.