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Radical MEP Olivier Dupuis on hunger strike Rome, 24 January 2004. On Sunday 18 January the Radical MEP Olivier Dupuis began a hunger strike to urge the governments of the democratic countries, beginning with the countries of the European Union, to tackle the issue of the Chechen genocide with determination, both from a political and a humanitarian point of view. Statement by Olivier Dupuis: "I have begun this hunger strike above all to express my solidarity towards the hundreds of thousands of Chechens abandoned to a tragic fate, the victims since 1994 of a full-fledged genocide hidden by the European ruling classes from the world of politics, finance, and the mass media; to express my solidarity towards them a few weeks before the 60th anniversary of the penultimate genocide of the Chechen people, on 23 February 1944, when Stalin ordered the deportation to Central Asia of the whole Chechen people, during which almost half the population died of starvation, cold and disease. My hunger strike is an instrument of struggle, of action, and of political dialogue. The things I am 'calling for' correspond to a series of political and institutional duties, or in some cases even juridical obligations, which no-one in Europe seems to want to fulfil, thus making it even more difficult - for the few people still concerned - to avert the final completion of the Chechen genocide and making it even easier, for the Russian occupying forces, to finish off the extermination ordered by the Russian Administration. In particular, I call on the Council, the Commission and the Parliament, and the governments and parliaments of the Member and Candidate States of the European Union: To acknowledge publicly that the Akhmadov Peace Plan in favour of the establishment of an interim United Nations administration in Chechnya constitutes the official proposal of the government of President Maskadov; To recognise officially the genocide suffered by the Chechen people in 1944, when Stalin ordered their deportation; To draw up, in accordance with article 14 section 3 of the EC treaty, a 'white list' of Chechen figures charged with promoting the search for a peaceful and political solution to the Russo-Chechen tragedy, allowing these persons to reside and travel freely in the territory of the Union; To guarantee security and dignified living conditions for the hundreds of thousands of Chechens who are living, often in inhuman conditions, in refugee camps inside and outside the borders of Russian territory, not even enjoying the protection of refugee status; To call on the Russian authorities to allow international organisations, NGOs, and journalists back to work and circulate freely in Chechnya; To support by every means possible the local and regional authorities who have expressed their willingness to accommodate and treat Chechen children wounded or mutilated by land-mines or bomb raids, in particular by offering the full collaboration of the diplomatic services, in order to remove all bureaucratic or material obstacles to entry into the territory of the Union; To welcome the thousands of Chechen students who are unable due to the war to study in their own country into universities and secondary schools in the Member States of the Union, also helping in this way to form the Chechen ruling class of the future. I invite the representatives of the local administrations and the European Regions: To set up and multiply initiatives of solidarity towards the Chechen people, supporting the Peace Plan for the establishment of an interim United Nations administration in Chechnya and welcoming Chechen students into their universities and wounded or mutilated children into their hospitals. I also invite citizens: To mobilise to increase the total of over 14,000 citizens, elected politicians and leading figures from more than 90 countries who have already signed the appeal in support of the Peace Plan for a UN administration in Chechnya; To mobilise to organise demonstrations on 23 February outside the seats of government, wherever possible, to commemorate the victims of the deportation of 1944, and the Chechen genocides of the past and the present". The appeal in support of the Peace Plan can be signed on-line at www.radicalparty.org ===== Don't forget Chechnya! You can support the Chechen Minister of Foreign Affairs Peace Plan for the establishment of an interim United Nations administration in Chechnya by signing the appeal on the TRP site: www.radicalparty.org ===== Olivier Dupuis Member of the European Parliament http://www.radicalparty.org/ tel. +32 2 284 7198
fax +32 2 284 9198
By Peter Slevin Washington Post Staff Writer Monday, January 26, 2004; 11:23 AM MOSCOW. Jan. 26 -- Secretary of State Colin L. Powell criticized Russia's democratic shortfalls and its aggressive relationships with former Soviet republics in unusually direct language Monday as he prepared to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin later in the day. In a front-page story in Izvestia, one of Moscow's most influential newspapers, Powell said publicly what President Bush has been saying privately to Putin in recent months. He said the U.S.-Russian relationship "will not achieve its potential" unless the two countries share "basic principles." "Russia's democratic system seems not yet to have found the essential balance among the executive, legislative and judicial functions. Political power is not yet tethered to law," Powell wrote. He added that neither the media nor political parties are yet free to operate as they choose. Powell criticized Putin's policy toward Chechnya, where Russian troops have fought brutally to suppress Chechnya's bid for independence. He also defended the "sovereign integrity" of former Soviet states that resent what they consider Russian meddling in their affairs. The decision by Powell to go public with his comments indicates worry within the Bush administration that Putin's consolidation of power -- viewed widely as anti-democratic -- poses a threat to Russia and its international relationships. Bush's private dealings with Putin have not produced the results sought by the White House, but it remained unclear Monday whether Powell had spoken of concrete consequences for Russia's behavior during nearly two hours with Putin later Monday and three hours with Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov. A State Department official said before the meeting that no markers would be laid down on issues of democracy and the rule of law. Powell did not elaborate on his Izvestia piece during a news conference with Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov or respond with details when asked about the issue during his flight to Europe. "It wasn't in any way an attempt on my part to interfere in internal dynamics of Russian political life. It was one friend speaking to another," Powell told reporters inside the Kremlin. Ivanov, without defending Russia's record publicly, said Putin offered a clear explanation that Powell would deliver to Bush. Ivanov said he hoped doubts "will be dispersed as a result." The United States and Russia are struggling to manage their differences over issues from Iranian nuclear development and Iraqi reconstruction to the role of the two longtime rivals in countries that Russia considers its backyard. Powell's trip to neighboring Georgia for Sunday's inauguration of U.S.-educated president Mikheil Saakashvili illustrated the tension. Although Powell asserted again Monday that the United States does not want to compete with Russia in Georgia, the Kremlin fears a growing American sphere of influence. U.S. troops are training troops in Georgia, which has collected nearly $1 billion in U.S. aid in the past dozen years and will received $166 million more during this fiscal year. Powell pressed Putin to honor his pledge to pull Russian troops from Georgia and close its bases there, a demand long sought by Georgia's government, which objects to what it considers an ugly legacy of Soviet rule. Russia has supported separatists in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, while the United States is backing Saakashvili's quest for a newly united Georgia. Ivanov told reporters that Russia is prepared to negotiate with the new Georgian government, a statement that drew approval from Powell, standing beside him in an ornate Kremlin chamber. Powell's article on Izvestia's front page marked a new level of U.S. criticism of Putin's strong-willed governing style. It follows a prominent call from Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) to get tougher with a Russian leader, whom Bush has courted and praised. McCain warned of "a creeping coup against the forces of democracy and market capitalism." "The new authoritarianism in Russia," McCain said, "is more than a test of America's ability to defend universal values that have taken shallow root since the Soviet empire collapsed. It presents a fundamental challenge to American interests across Eurasia." During a September session at the Camp David presidential retreat, Bush credited Putin with promoting freedom and democracy. The comment troubled many Russia analysts who had watched Putin's government take control of much of the nation's broadcast media, reserve prominent roles for security services and challenge the independence of the business elite. U.S. Ambassador Alexander Vershbow has spoken of a pernicious "values gap" between the two countries, to the consternation of the Kremlin, which felt it had earned the respect of Bush. Powell, by writing the Izvestia piece, publicly backed his top diplomat and reflected the current White House view, U.S. officials said. Bush began raising issues of the rule of law more prominently in telephone conversations with Putin late last fall after the arrest of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Russia's richest man and the former head of the Yukos oil conglomerate. High-ranking U.S. officials believe the arrest and treatment of the businessman, a potential rival to Putin, was orchestrated by the Kremlin for political reasons. More recently, the Bush administration endorsed the conclusions of European observers that Dec. 7 Duma elections were a "regression in the democratization process." The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said Putin's government unfairly boosted the campaigns of its favorites, who now dominate the Russian parliament. White House officials have been hoping that worries about Russia's future among foreign investors will help deter Putin, who has turned toward the West in a bid to boost Russia's economy. Uncertain of Putin's ultimate direction, they hope the disciplined former KGB officer will one day carry out his promises to develop liberty and the rule of law. "Russia has too much to offer the world for us to allow the promise of our partnership to go unfulfilled," Powell wrote in Izvestia. "We hope that Russia's path to mature democracy and prosperity is cleared soon of all obstacles." RosBusinessConsulting. Monday, Jan. 26, 2004 Cooperation between Russia and the Council of Europe stepped up from merely monitoring the observance of human rights to implementing real programs for restoring peaceful life in Chechnya and rendering assistance in establishing new authorities and civil society in the republic, according to Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko. The spokesman specified that from June 2000 to April 2003 cooperation between Russia and the Council of Europe regarding Chechnya had been based on the permanent presence of the council's experts at the office of the Russian presidential envoy for ensuring human rights and freedoms in Chechnya. Activities of the experts were almost entirely confined to monitoring related problems in the region and registering complaints from the public in the event their human rights were violated. In late 2003, Russia and the Council of Europe came to an agreement on principle guidelines of collaboration seeking to improve the situation in the breakaway republic. From now on, the council's experts will not stay in Chechnya on a permanent basis, and will be called by the Russian side for performing specific missions under a corresponding program for 2004. -------------------------
Glad to be Deceived”: the International Community and Chechnya By Rachel Denber
The armed conflict in Chechnya, now in its fourth year, is the most serious human rights crisis of the new decade in Europe. It has taken a disastrous toll on the civilian population and is now one of the greatest threats to stability and rule of law in Russia. Yet the international community’s response to it has been shameful and shortsighted. The international community has a moral and political obligation to protect fundamental rights of people in and around Chechnya. It should with a unified voice be prevailing on the Russian government to halt forced disappearances, torture, and arbitrary detention, which Russian forces perpetrate on a daily basis. It should be compiling documentation about abuses into an authoritative, official record. It should be vigorously pressing for a credible accountability process for perpetrators of serious violations of international humanitarian law, and should think strategically about how to achieve this when the Russian court system fails to deliver justice. And it should stop Russia from forcing the return of displaced people to areas where their safety and well-being cannot be ensured. But none of this has happened. The international community has instead chosen the path of self-deception, choosing to believe Russia’s claims that the situation in Chechnya is stabilizing, and so be spared of making tough decisions about what actions are necessary to stop flagrant abuses and secure the well-being of the people of the region. The year 2003 saw no improvement in the international community’s disappointing response to the Chechen situation. All the international community could muster were well-intended statements of concern that were never reinforced with political, diplomatic, financial or other consequences. Chechnya was placed on the agenda of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, the highest human rights body within the U.N. system, but even there a resolution on Chechnya failed to pass. No government leader was willing to press for specific improvements during summits with Russian President Vladimir V. Putin. In late 2002 the Russian government closed the field office in Chechnya of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). And to date the Russian government had still not invited U.N. special rapporteurs on torture and extrajudicial executions to visit the region. And unlike in other armed conflicts in Europe, few foreign missions in Russia sought to gather first-hand information about continuing human rights abuses. It did not have to be this way. Events of the past decade have shown that however flawed their policies might be in many respects, concerned states and intergovernmental bodies can play a significant role in addressing human rights violations. Even in the Balkans, where the international community failed to stop horrific abuses as they were occurring, concerned states eventually supported the creation of the International Criminal Tribunal on the former Yugoslavia, a significant and likely long-lasting contribution to security and human rights in the region. Hundreds of OSCE monitors deployed to Kosovo in November 1998 were able to create official documentation of massacres and other human rights abuses. To be sure, there are important political obstacles to affecting Russia’s behavior in Chechnya. Because it is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, Russia was able to shield Chechnya from serious U.N. scrutiny, save for the U.N. Commission on Human Rights in 2000 and 2001. The U.S. and European governments have broad political and economic agendas with Russia, ranging from strategic missile defense to energy security to Russian policy in the Middle East. But none of these factors can justify or fully explain the international community’s reluctance to promote human rights protections in and around Chechnya, or why Russia never has had to face significant consequences for abuses by its troops. International disengagement on Chechnya became more marked after the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States. Russia, which had since 1999 called the conflict in Chechnya a “counter-terror operation,” soon began to argue that the war in Chechnya was its contribution to the U.S.-led global campaign against terrorism. Russia succeeded in further shielding the conflict from scrutiny in international forums and in Russia itself. Western governments have emphasized the need for Russia to find a political solution to the conflict. But they fail to see the role that continuing abuses play in prolonging it. For this reason, the policy of disengagement is shortsighted. As abuses continue, and as there continues to be no credible accountability process, Chechens appear to be losing what faith or hope they may have had in the Russian government. Disengagement, particularly now, is untimely. Russia has spared little effort to present the situation as stabilizing. But it has proven incapable of ending the conflict; instead, in 2003 it began to spill into neighboring Ingushetia, with Russian forces perpetrating the same abuses there as they have in Chechnya. In the long term, disengagement on Chechnya is a disservice to human rights in Russia. Having faced no diplomatic or other consequences for its crimes in Chechnya, the Russian government has certainly learned an important lesson about the limits of the international community’s political will in pursuing human rights. Unchecked patterns of abuse by Russia’s forces in Chechnya will eventually affect the rest of Russian society. Tens of thousands of police and security forces have done tours of duty in Chechnya, after which they return to their home regions, bringing with them learned patterns of brutality and impunity. Several Russian human rights groups have begun to note a “Chechen syndrome” among police who served in Chechnya—a particular pattern of physical abuse and other dehumanizing treatment of people in custody. Russians already face serious risk of torture in police custody. The Chechnya experience is thus undermining efforts to promote the rule of law in Russia’s criminal justice system. Human Rights Abuses in the Chechnya ConflictRussia’s second armed conflict in Chechnya in the 1990s began in September 1999. Russia claimed it was a counter-terror operation, aimed at eliminating the chaos that had reined in Chechnya since the end of the 1994-1996 Chechen war and at liquidating terrorist groups that had found haven there. Five months of indiscriminate bombing and shelling in 1999 and early 2000 resulted in thousands of civilian deaths. Three massacres, which followed combat operations, took the lives of at least 130 people. By March 2000, Russia’s federal forces gained at least nominal control over most of Chechnya. They began a pattern of classic “dirty war” tactics and human rights abuses that continue to mark the conflict to this day. Russian forces arbitrarily detain those allegedly suspected of being, or collaborating with, rebel fighters and torture them in custody to secure confessions or testimony. In some cases, the corpses of those last seen in Russian custody were subsequently found, bearing marks of torture and summary execution, in dumping grounds or unmarked graves. More often, those last seen in custody are simply never seen again—they have been forcibly disappeared. Make no mistake, Chechen rebel forces too have committed grave crimes, including numerous brutal attacks targeting civilians in and outside of Chechnya, killing and injuring many. Rebel fighters were also responsible for assassinations of civil servants cooperating with the pro-Moscow Chechen administration of Chechnya. Anti-personnel land mines laid by fighters and Russian forces claimed the lives of federal soldiers and civilians alike. At the height of the Chechen war in 2000, as many as 300,000 people had been displaced from their homes, with most living in the neighboring republic of Ingushetia. Of these, 40,000 resided in tent camps. By 2003, the cycle of arbitrary detention, torture, and forced disappearance was well entrenched, and the crisis of forced disappearances appeared to have become a permanent one. According to unpublished governmental statistics, 126 people were abducted and presumed “disappeared” in January and February 2003 alone. In mid-August, the Chechen Ministry of Internal Affairs said that nearly 400 people had “disappeared” in Chechnya since the beginning of the year. Local officials in 2003 have also admitted the existence of forty-nine mass graves containing the remains of nearly 3,000 civilians. As noted above, the conflict increasingly has spilled over the Chechen border into Ingushetia, still a haven for tens of thousands of displaced Chechens, and Russian operations there have been as abusive as they are in Chechnya. In June 2003, Russian and pro-Moscow Chechen forces conducted at least seven security operations in Ingushetia, five of them in settlements for Chechen displaced persons. The operations involved numerous cases of arbitrary arrest and detention, ill-treatment, and looting. As with abuses committed in Chechnya, authorities failed to diligently investigate the violations and hold perpetrators accountable. Russian authorities in Ingushetia also have kept up steady pressure on displaced people living in tent camps to return to Chechnya. Throughout 2003, as in 2002, federal and local migration authorities intermittently cut off gas, electricity, water, and other infrastructure services to several of the camps and removed hundreds of people from camp registration lists, causing them to be evicted. In addition, officials threatened the displaced people with arrests on false charges such as drugs and weapons possession, and impending security sweeps. Migration authorities closed one camp in the middle of winter in 2002, another in October 2003, and as of this writing seemed set to close yet a third; meanwhile, authorities blocked the construction of alternative shelters in Ingushetia. Closing the tent camps, which at this writing housed more than 12,000 displaced Chechens, and pressuring people to return to Chechnya is part of a larger government strategy to put the Chechnya “problem” back inside Chechnya so that authorities can claim that the situation there is “normalizing.” Such claims, in turn, are used to support Russia’s position that international scrutiny of the republic is no longer justifiable. The International ResponseThe international community was poorly positioned to respond effectively to these developments because it had acquiesced in Russia’s efforts to keep outside observers from being deployed to Chechnya. In late 2002 the Russian government refused to renew the mandate of the OSCE Assistance Group, effectively closing the organization’s important field presence in Chechnya. Since mid-2001, the Assistance Group had reported on human rights conditions, facilitated humanitarian relief, and promoted a peaceful resolution of the crisis in Chechnya. Negotiations over renewing the OSCE mandate collapsed after Russia insisted that the mission relinquish its human rights and political dimensions. To its credit, the OSCE refused. After the closure, the Dutch chairmanship pressed for a new OSCE presence with a human rights component, but did not receive support from other OSCE participating states necessary to make the effort successful. As already noted, a resolution sponsored by the European Union on Chechnya failed to pass at the 2003 session of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights for the second year in a row. It was rejected in part because the European Union seemed to will it to fail: as in 2002, it used the threat of a resolution only as a bargaining chip to coax the Russian government into agreeing to a much weaker chairman’s statement. This strategy was misguided in its optimism, given that the Russian government had ever since the beginning of the conflict vehemently rejected international criticism of its conduct of the war and mobilized diplomatic resources to keep the Chechnya issue out of the U.N. When Russia predictably walked away from the chairman’s statement negotiations, the E.U. introduced the resolution but then purposively failed to advocate for its adoption, and refused to share information about its strategy with third party states. In January 2003, the Chechnya rapporteur for the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) Lord Judd put forward a resolution calling on Russia to postpone a constitutional referendum for Chechnya planned for March, citing the escalating conflict and persistence of human rights abuses and a poor security environment. After a hot debate, PACE rejected this proposal, and instead called on Russia to ensure appropriate conditions for the referendum. Lord Judd resigned in protest. In April, PACE adopted a highly critical resolution on the human rights situation and the lack of accountability in Chechnya. UNHCR worked hard to ensure protection for displaced persons in Ingushetia in 2002-03, and protested Russian government efforts to force them back. As authorities moved to close camps, UNHCR was able to prevent eighty families from being left homeless in Ingushetia. UNHCR’s efforts are admirable. But Russia’s intent to close tent camps could not be clearer, and UNHCR’s efforts will not be sufficient unless U.N. member states also seek and obtain political commitments from Russia that ensure protection for displaced persons. At the bilateral level, little apparent effort was made at the highest levels to press Russia to improve human rights protections in the region. President Putin received a ringing endorsement from governments around the world who helped him celebrate the 300th anniversary of the founding of St. Petersburg. Chechnya was at the bottom of the agendas in summits with British Prime Minister Tony Blair and U.S. President George W. Bush. Speaking on behalf of the Italian presidency of the European Union, Silvio Berlusconi even went so far as to praise the Chechen presidential elections, which nearly every independent observer said were rigged. Antecedents to InactionMany analysts attribute international diffidence with respect to abuses in Chechnya to changing international priorities after September 11, 2001, particularly the increasing focus on global security. But in fact the antecedents to inaction go much farther back, even to the early months of the war. The international community deserves credit for the strong and forthright criticism it mounted at that time, and for efforts to bring diplomatic pressure to bear to convince the government to rein in abusive troops and allow access to the region. But the effort for the most part was half-hearted and short-lived, ending soon after Vladimir Putin, who became acting president upon Boris Yeltsin’s resignation on December 31, 1999, was elected president in March 2000. In the early months of the war, Russian forces razed Grozny in indiscriminate bombing, killing thousands, arrested thousands more, and summarily executed more than 130 detained persons in post-battle sweep operations. International criticism was sharp. The OSCE in 1999 insisted on a reaffirmation of its mandate in Chechnya, and in April 2000, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe suspended Russia’s voting rights, restoring them only in January 2001. In late 1999, the EU adopted a decision to freeze certain technical assistance programs because of Chechnya and recommended that embassy personnel travel to the region and gather information on events there. But after Yeltsin’s resignation the EU toned down its rhetoric; the recommendation to send in diplomats was never implemented. The limits the international community set for itself in this early period would set the parameters for years to come. Only the PACE recognized massacres of noncombatants as war crimes. International actors apparently were not prepared to follow through on the consequences that recognizing the massacres as war crimes would entail. No government or multilateral institution was willing to consider linking financial benefits to improvements on the ground in Chechnya or the creation of a credible accountability process. The World Bank, which arguably had the most leverage and a mandate to withhold aid on human rights grounds, released U.S. $450 million in structural adjustment loan payments to Russia during the first year of the war, which went directly to the Russian government for unrestricted general budgetary spending. Multilateral institutions and their member states also resisted pressing for an accountability process that had any international involvement, putting their faith in the Russian government to establish a credible domestic monitoring and accountability process. Council of Europe member states did not act on PACE’s recommendation that they file an interstate complaint against Russia with the European Court of Human Rights. In 2000 and 2001 the U.N. Human Rights Commission adopted strong resolutions condemning human rights abuses in Chechnya and calling on Russia to invite U.N. thematic mechanisms to the region. But it stopped short of calling for an international commission of inquiry, requiring instead that Russia establish a national commission of inquiry. The Russian government bitterly opposed the resolution, and vowed not to cooperate with its recommendations. At the time, Human Rights Watch and others urged the Commission to call for an international commission of inquiry, which could operate, albeit in a limited capacity, in the face of Russian objections. We had serious doubts that the Russian government would establish a thorough and impartial monitoring or accountability process. The Russian government established a human rights office in Chechnya, headed by President Putin’s special envoy on human rights in Chechnya. A national commission of inquiry was formed, in name only. Neither institution had the authority to investigate or prosecute violations of humanitarian law or human rights law, and neither produced an official record of the abuses committed by both sides of the conflict. In April 2001, at the request of PACE, the Russian government made available a list of criminal investigations related to the Chechnya conflict. This list revealed the extent of the impunity for crimes committed in the conflict: the vast majority of criminal cases were not under active investigation; no cases had made it to the courts; and there was no investigation into widespread torture, one of the key abuses of the conflict. The international community had an important role to play in documenting abuses, both to inform policy toward Russia and, ultimately, to produce an official record of the abuses committed in the conflict. In 1999, the EU instructed heads of embassies of its member states to visit the region to gather information on humanitarian assistance. In sharp contrast to its efforts in Kosovo prior to March 1999, the instruction was not implemented, and working-level visits by diplomats to the region were few and far between. The OSCE’s Assistance Group to Grozny was the best equipped institution to lead a documentation effort on Chechnya. It had documented abuses in the 1994-1996 Chechnya conflict, played a crucial role in negotiating an end to it, and was still on the ground as late as 1998. The OSCE subsequently had gained institutional expertise in documenting humanitarian law violations in Kosovo. Its book, As Seen as Told, remains to this day one of the most authoritative accounts of the abuses that occurred in Kosovo prior to March 1999. It could not apply this experience to Chechnya, as Russia’s prodigious efforts at presenting obstacles caused the Assistance Group to postpone its redeployment until May 2001. And even after its redeployment, the Assistance Group was constrained in its reporting. In 2000, the Council of Europe seconded experts for Putin’s special representative for human rights in Chechnya, but they spent most of the year in Strasbourg. After a bomb exploded near the experts’ passing car in Chechnya in April 2003, they deemed the security situation too volatile to return. Even prior to that date, the work of the experts in Chechnya had been severely inhibited by their limited mandate, which prevented them from freely moving around Chechnya and conducting investigations of key incidents on their own initiative. The reporting of the experts generally contained little information that could not be found in other sources and information on human rights abuses was often of a general nature. The quality of reporting had improved in late 2002, but since April 2003 the experts have been forced to do their work in Strasbourg, which has made it impossible for them to directly monitor the situation on the ground. As prime minister, Putin had staked his political career on the “counterterror” operation in Chechnya. Under his presidency the government, and he personally, greeted international criticism of the campaign, no matter how mild, with outbursts, threats, and indignation. If the strategy aimed to dampen Russia’s interlocutors’ enthusiasm for constructive intervention, it was successful. By mid-2000, Western leaders understood that Putin, until then a political unknown, had consolidated power and would lead Russia for at least four more years. They generally ceased to press Russia for concessions on Chechnya. This meant that the international community’s most important multilateral achievements on Chechnya—resolutions at the United Nations Human Rights Commission, resolutions by the PACE, and the like—received no reinforcement at the bilateral level, and so went unheeded. Russia, Chechnya, and the Global Campaign against TerrorBy September 11, 2001, the war in Chechnya, its toll on civilians and its broader implications for the rule of law in Russia had fallen off the agenda of many of Russia’s interlocutors. After the attacks in the United States, as noted above, Russia cast the conflict in Chechnya as its contribution to the global campaign against terrorism, pointing to links certain Chechen field commanders allegedly had to al-Qaeda. Russia’s cooperation was needed in the war in Afghanistan, and would later be sought in the U.S. war in Iraq. Several heads of state indicated outright that Russia’s conduct in Chechnya would be seen in a new light. The horrific hostage-taking by Chechen rebels on a Moscow theater in October 2002 caused revulsion in Russia and throughout the world, and lent credence to Putin’s assertions and, in the minds of some, seemed to confirm the existence of links between certain rebel groups and al-Qaeda. A series of suicide bombings in Chechnya and other parts of Russia in 2002 and 2003 killed and maimed hundreds more. Already made a lower priority, Chechnya practically disappeared from governments’ public agendas with Russia. Neither the European Union, its member states, nor the United States has had the political courage to mount strong criticism at key moments, or call publicly for accountability or for U.N. rapporteurs to be allowed to visit the region. Most governments have called publicly and in a coordinated fashion for Russia to desist from compelling displaced persons to return to Chechnya. But after so many years of criticism unmatched by a credible threat of sanction, such words yielded little effect. In dealing with Chechnya today, governments and multilateral institutions for the most part stress the need for a political solution to the conflict, rather than pressing for an immediate end to human rights abuses, let alone holding Russia and Chechen rebels to account for them. Many argue that the abuses will end only when the conflict ends. The international community should not be reproached for seeking an end the conflict in Chechnya, but emphasizing this goal over all others overlooks the fact that it is the continuing cycle of abuses that fuel the conflict. To end the conflict, the Russian government has to build in the population of Chechnya an atmosphere of trust in Russia’s institutions. But the daily grind of torture, arbitrary detention, and forced disappearances instead sows further mistrust. As people see their loved ones killed or disappeared they have less incentive not to join the rebel effort. Russia’s efforts at finding a political solution—at “normalizing” the situation—are not ending the conflict in Chechnya, but rather making the conflict less visible to the outside world. The constitutional referendum held in Chechnya in March 2003, and the subsequent presidential elections in October, were widely advertised by the Russian government as a final stage of stabilization of conditions in the republic. In reality, the referendum and elections took place against a background of continuing and escalating violence, and independent observers unanimously believed that the elections were rigged. Yet the Russian government has continued to use both elections to convince the outside world that the situation is normalizing through a political process, and to argue that international scrutiny or other involvement is no longer justified. Ironically, as the Russian government is emphasizing the international implications of the Chechnya operation for the global campaign against terrorism, it is shutting the region to international scrutiny and cooperation. This discredits Russia’s partners in the global campaign against terrorism among those inside Chechnya who suffer form lawlessness and abuse at the hands of Russia’s forces and Chechen rebels. As Russian forces enjoy impunity for crimes in Chechnya, and as Russia has escaped any significant diplomatic consequences for such crimes, the Russian government may come to expect nothing less than international disengagement on human rights more generally in Russia. The Russian public may conclude that it is acceptable for the government to be unaccountable for its actions. This will stunt progress on human rights in Russia for years to come, as the government learns to simply dismiss criticism of its broader human rights record, confident that words, no matter how tough, will never translate into action. The Way ForwardRussia’s sway within the international arena should not hinder a robust response from the international community on human rights abuses in Chechnya. The international community should consider that Russia’s involvement in the war against terrorism raises rather than diminishes the stakes of its conduct in Chechnya. Russia’s status as a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council, and its ability to remove Chechnya from the U.N.’s agenda, heightens the importance of regional mechanisms—the Council of Europe and the OSCE. To be effective, these institutions require first and foremost the support of their member governments in their bilateral relations with Russia. At the same time, U.N. officials, including the secretary-general, should press Russian authorities to allow U.N. institutions and mechanisms to play a role in monitoring and promoting human rights in Chechnya. This too is a message that must be reinforced in bilateral relations. Russia’s interlocutors should coordinate to deliver a unified message on the need for accountability for crimes against civilians, access to the region by human rights monitors, continued international assistance to displaced persons, and an end to involuntary returns to Chechnya. They should use summits and multilateral meetings as opportunities to press for specific benchmarks—including an updated, detailed list of investigations and prosecutions; invitations to the U.N. special rapporteurs on torture, extrajudicial executions, and violence against women; and binding commitments not to compel displaced persons to return to Chechnya until it is safe to do so, to provide decent and humane shelter to those who continue to be displaced, and to allow for international agencies to continue to provide relief for them. They should press for these benchmarks publicly and forcefully, and make clear that political, diplomatic, and financial consequences will follow should improvements not be forthcoming. The international community can also help the cause of justice by supporting local organizations that help victims of abuse in Chechnya press their claims with the European Court of Human Rights. Once there is momentum on justice, international financial institutions should make clear that they will make the Russian government’s compliance with court judgments a condition for future loan and credit disbursements. Wishing away the human rights crisis in Chechnya will in the long run will not serve the goal of a peaceful resolution to the armed conflict. It is also a disservice to the thousands of people who have suffered human rights abuses and who are left with nowhere to turn for justice. A robust international response to Russia, one that backs words with action, is a critical part of the solution. Human Rights Watch - January 2004. |