COPENHAGEN, October 29 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Chechen exiles appealed in an open letter to Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, October 29, to immediately halt a brutal war in the breakaway republic that they say is nothing short of “genocide.”

“We call on you to take immediate steps to stop the suffering of the Chechen people,” the World Chechen Congress said in the letter on the final day of a conference here that provoked fierce protests from the Kremlin.

“The Chechen people are being eliminated by Russian forces and you are the commander in chief,” it said, calling for negotiations between Russia and Chechnya, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.

“There are no alternatives to political dialogue.”

The three-year “forgotten war” between Russian forces and Chechens fighting for independence was thrust back into the spotlight after armed Chechen commandos held 800 people captive in a theatre for three days.

Russian forces stormed into the southern republic in October 1999 after a first war from 1994 to 1996.

The latest Russian campaign has left a heavy toll - Russia says at least 4,500 soldiers have been killed, while conference speakers said up to 150,000 lives had been lost on the Chechen side, many of them children, and tens of thousands more have fled.

“This is not a war on terrorism but simply genocide of a small ethnic nation called Chechnya,” said Congress president Mohammad Shishani.

Denmark allowed the conference to go ahead only days after the bloody end to the siege, despite Russia accusing it of “solidarity with terrorists.”

The Danish authorities however agreed to move an E.U. summit with Russia next month to Brussels after Moscow warned it would boycott the event if it was held in Copenhagen.

The letter to Putin said congress delegates “condemned all terrorism” including the hostage stand-off which it said had hindered any push for a peaceful solution to the conflict.

But it added: “State terrorism is the most dangerous form ... based on the full power of the state, its armed forces and police.”

Ahmed Zakayev, official envoy for Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov at the conference, earlier denied having threatened Russian nuclear sites and insisted Chechen leaders would have nothing to do with “terror attacks”.

Russian occupation of Chechnya has been going on for 200 years

The letter to Putin expressed dismay at Russia’s attempt to ban the Copenhagen conference, saying the only goal was to seek a solution to the suffering of the Chechen people.

Russia had claimed there were “terrorists” among delegates, who included top Chechen officials, campaigners from both Russia and Chechnya and acclaimed British actress Vanessa Redgrave.

Putin has vowed to retaliate after the Moscow siege and refuses to negotiate with the separatists, insisting they have links to international terrorism, including top terror suspect Osama bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda network.

But many speakers said talks were the only way to resolve the situation in the breakaway republic.

“With blood it cannot be done,” said Elena Vilenskaya of the Russian Soldiers’ Mothers movement, which campaigns for the withdrawal of the 80,000 Russian troops in Chechnya. “We must move towards reconciliation. We cannot come to peace in any other way.”

Redgrave, founder of the International Campaign for Peace and Human Rights in Chechnya, said the people were being subjected to “cruel and barbaric” treatment in “ghettos” she likened to Stalin’s notorious Gulag labor camps.

A short film she produced about the plight of children in the conflict was shown at the conference - images of villages bombarded by Russian forces, a crying baby with only a stub for leg, a young girl with hands wrapped in bandages like boxing gloves.

“The tragedy is that it has come back into the press because of the terrorist action in Moscow,” she told AFP.

“It grieves me that stories (of Chechnya) are only wanted when there is a massacre or a tragedy.”.

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