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Maskhadov Asks G7 to Intervene on Behalf of Chechnya
MOSCOW, July 20 (News Agencies) - Separatist Chechen leader Aslan Maskhadov appealed Friday to the G7 leaders of the world's most developed nations meeting in Genoa, Italy, to demand that Russian President Vladimir Putin end the 20-month war in his republic.
Maskhadov's message noted that the three-day summit's agenda that opened Friday was focusing on issues like the spread of poverty and deadly disease around the world.
But he expressed concern that the war in the North Caucasus enclave was no longer of interest to world powers because any protests about the brutal conflict threatened to destabilize the West's relations with Russia.
"I, Aslan Maskhadov, the democratically elected president of Chechnya, write this desperate appeal in the name of my people, the victims of a genocidal war whose daily murder has yet to awaken the consciousness of the world you lead," Maskhadov wrote in his message.
"We are as wretched, bloody and enslaved as you are rich, mighty and free," said Maskhadov in a copy of the letter obtained by AFP.
The letter was addressed to the G7 economic group that excludes Russia due to its slow pace of liberal reform.
Russia remains a member of the G8 grouping that focuses on political affairs.
"So how is it that you celebrate [former Yugoslav president] Slobodan Milosevic at last facing judgment at The Hague but embrace Putin as a credible partner," Maskhadov demanded.
"Any Chechen can be arrested without charge or receive capital punishment without trial. Summary executions are an everyday occurrence for men, women and children of any age."
Maskhadov was elected president of Chechnya in 1997 just months after Russia suffered a humiliating defeat in a 1994-96 war that, according to some estimates, claimed 80,000 lives.
Observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe approved those elections.
Moscow, however, refused to recognize Maskhadov's leadership shortly after storming into Chechnya on October 1, 1999 in a self-declared anti-"terrorist" operation that has claimed the lives of at least 3,000 federal troops.
The toll among civilians and separatist fighters has never been disclosed.
Maskhadov's letter comes amid an uproar over the Russian troops' recent "mop-up" operations in several western Chechen villages in which hundreds of civilians were detained and their homes looted or destroyed.
The Council of Europe has called on Moscow to condemn "at the highest level" the human rights violations perpetrated by the Russian military in Chechnya.
Human rights observers, and even a member of the Russian parliament, note that several people - according to some reports more than a dozen - remain either unaccounted for or are feared dead.
After initial conflicting reports, the Russian army said Thursday that six soldiers have since been arrested in connection with raids on villages of Assinovskaya, Sernovodsk and Khorchaloi.
The six were detained for kidnappings, banditry and abuse of power during security sweeps in the Chechen villages, the office of the Kremlin's spokesman on Chechnya told AFP.
The army said two federal officers have already been dismissed.
Authorities have in the past questioned soldiers in connection with some massacres, but so far only one officer has been put on trial, for murdering a Chechen girl.
The head of the pro-Moscow administration in Chechnya, Akhmad Kadyrov, on Friday asked to meet with Putin in Moscow to discuss the case.
Kadyrov said he would demand that the investigation into the mopping-up operations - which have been conducted throughout the war in a self-declared bid to separate civilians from the separatist fighters - lead all the way to the top of the Russian military command.
"In such cases, the commanders rather than the soldiers must bear responsibility," Kadyrov said. "The Chechen people's trust will never be recovered with the arrest of six soldiers. The commanders must answer as well."
In addition, the Kremlin last week admitted that it was considering a change of tactics in the war.
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