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| Caucasus |
| Conflicting accounts of Maskhadov's involvement... |
| 2002-10-25 |
| News conflicted Friday, October 25, about the role played by Chechen separatist President Aslan Maskhadov in the three-day long Moscow hostage-taking tragedy. Of course it conflicted. There are Islamists involved, so that means the truth, if any, won't be... Russia, for its part, accused Maskhadov of personally organizing the hostage-taking, in which Chechen commandos seized more than 700 civilians, an accusation denied by That would seem to involve him, wouldn't it? However, a top aide to Maskhadov said Chechen rebel leaders had not known that Chechen separatists were planning the attack and that they condemned it. Maskhadov "categorically condemns this terrorist act", his spokesman, Akhmed Zakayev, said in a Radio Free Europe interview. "Blood of innocents? Nope. Nope. Wudn't us. It's, ummmm... somebody else. The Great Maskhadov washes his hands of the matter, over and over." "The official authority of Chechnya was not aware" the attack was being prepared, Zakayev added. "I tell you officially that Chechnya's state committee of defense did not decide to carry out military action on the territory of the enemy." "Off the record, well, we talked it up, and I dunno if they ever really decided things, 'cuz they got to telling jokes about Jews and who was gonna be executed next, so I got up to have another glass of iced tea..." The rebel leadership was "prepared to help the hostages if the Russian government asks us", Zakayev went on. You could start by telling the Bad Guys to let them go. That'd help a lot. Betcha don't do that, though... “The gunmen, holding hundreds of people in a Moscow theatre, are not officially connected to us, but are desperate people who have lost their families." So now they want somebody else's? That doesn't make any sense... But, in Moscow the leader of the Chechen hostage-takers, Movsar Barayev, told a western journalist he was acting on the orders of Maskhadov and top field commander Shamil Basayev. "Barayev said it was a joint action of Maskhadov and Basayev, that they were under their orders," said British Sunday Times journalist Mark Franchetti, who met overnight with the Chechen commandos. "Thought it was them, anyway. One's a big guy, dark hair, a beard? And the other one's missing half a dozen pieces?" Franchetti said the guerrillas old him "they do not intend to go anywhere, with hostages or without them, until there are changes in Chechnya. They have fulfilled their task. Now it is up to Putin to decide." If he has half a brain, he's gonna decide to kill them all. For one thing, if he doesn't, the Russers will turn on him. He wouldn't like that... |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |