Europe condemns Russian blast

Sunday 6 July 2003


Leaders from the European Union and Israel condemned as unjustifiable attacks carried out by two suspected Chechen suicide bombers who killed 16 other people and injured some 50 at a Moscow rock festival.

Two female suicide bombers blew themselves up at a Moscow rock festival attended by 400,000.

The bombers struck at a ticket booth after guards refused to let them into the popular day-long outdoor festival that had begun several hours earlier at Tushino airfield in north-western Moscow.

A spokesman for the Moscow police department, Valery Gribakin, told the Interfax news agency that 14 people and the two suicide bombers died at the scene of the attack.

Medical sources separately told Russian news agencies that two more people had died in hospital, bringing the total death toll, including the two death bombers, to 18.

Officials immediately said the suicide blasts were the latest in a series of deadly attacks carried out by Chechen separatist rebels aimed at disrupting Russian plans to bring peace to the war-torn republic.

France called the attacks "heinous," while Britain labelled them a "horrific" terrorist blast and the Italian EU presidency said the bloody blasts only strengthened European resolve in the fight against extremism.

French President Jacques Chirac expressed his indignation at the attacks.

"No cause can justify such acts," he said in a letter to his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin.

A French foreign ministry spokeswoman also condemned the attacks as "particularly heinous... France presents its condolences to the families of the victims and expresses its solidarity to the Russian authorities in this hard time," Cecile Pozzo di Borgo added in a statement.

Britain also expressed outrage at the bombings.

"I condemn in the strongest possible terms this horrific and indiscriminate attack on innocent people," Foreign Office Minister Bill Rammell said in a statement.

"Terrorism in all its forms has no place in a civilised society and my heartfelt sympathy goes out to the victims and to their families," he said.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair raised the question of Chechnya last month when the Russian president paid a state visit to London.

Russia is meanwhile seeking the extradition from Britain of a top Chechen envoy, Akhmed Zakayev, to stand trial for alleged extremist activities in Chechnya between 1995 and 2000. He denies the charges. *

2003 AFP

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Comment: And as usual the relatives of the 150.000 (or more) Chechens killed, and the 100.000 refugees are still waiting for a word, only one word, of condolences by the same persons after almost ten years of terror from side of the Russian death squads. Apparently in this case they found a "cause that can justify such acts". M.M.