CHECHNYA/ATTACK IN MOSCOW: STATEMENT BY OLIVIER DUPUIS, ON THE 19TH DAY OF HIS HUNGER STRIKE

Turin, 6 February 2004 - On 18 January the Radical MEP Olivier Dupuis began a hunger strike to urge the authorities of the European Union and of the Member States finally to address the question of the Chechen genocide with determination, from a political and humanitarian point of view. In Turin, where he is taking part in the presentation of the book Chechnya nella morsa dell'impero (published by Guerini e Associati), he issued the following statement on the attack in the Moscow underground:

"This appalling terrorist attack in the Moscow underground is yet another result of the alliance between those in Moscow who continue to push for a violent, military resolution of the Chechen question and those in Chechnya who are now irresponsibly trapped in a heroic, romantic vision of their own destiny and that of their own faction, without any concern for the future of their country. (*)

Like President Maskhadov and his government, like the vast majority of Chechens, and like over 60% of Russians, I am hoping and working - together with my friends in the Transnational Radical Party - for a political solution to the Russo-Chechen tragedy, founded on justice, dialogue and non-violence. I am convinced that if the international community continues to abandon the moderate, pro-European and pro-Western Maskhadov government and to ignore its Peace Plan, the only alternative to the Russian terrorism in Chechnya risks becoming Chechen "counter-terrorism". In this context, to speak - as the European Union and the United States have done so far - about war on terrorism or unity against terrorism is no more than an exercise of cynical hypocrisy. The recourse to terrorist actions or war against Russian civilians can only be stopped  by supporting an alternative that can stop the war and the genocide of the Chechen people. Even the extremist factions of the Chechen cause are well aware of this: recently, for example, they have attacked me because I support the Akhmadov-Maskhadov Plan for the establishment of an interim UN administration in Chechnya, rather than attacking other European politicians who, by declaring their unity of purpose with Putin, merely reinforce the status quo of death and violence in Chechnya and, increasingly, in Russia".

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CHECHNYA/RUSSIA: WILL PUTIN'S STATEMENTS LEAD BLAIR, BERLUSCONI, CHIRAC AND SCHROEDER TO REFLECT ?

Statement by Olivier Dupuis, Radical Member of the European Parliament, now on the 20th day of his hunger strike for Chechnya

Brussels, 7 February 2004. "To hear Vladimir Putin, the head of a State that claims to be democratic, talk about the 'elimination' and 'liquidation' of terrorists and come out with the name of the man he claims to be behind the attack, even before the official inquiry has begun, is enough to make us shudder. As are the comments of those in the European Union and the United States who continue to give credence to Putin's so-called war on terrorism. As if what has happened in Grozny, razed to the ground, and in Chechen towns and villages bombed and set on fire for years, with tens of thousands of civilian victims, has anything to do with what is happening in the Basque country and Northern Ireland, or with what has happened in Germany, Italy, or France, where difficult anti-terrorist battles - with many mistakes, admittedly - have been waged or continue to be waged! What Putin is doing in Chechnya, on the other hand, is quite simply a policy of terror aimed at wiping out the Chechen people. Will Blair, Berlusconi, Chirac and Schroeder finally realise this? Will they realise that the only solution to the Russo-Chechen tragedy must be political?"

You can support the Peace Plan for an interim United Nations administration in Chechnya by signing the international appeal at: www.radicalparty.org