Chechen Kidnappers Demand Ransom For Captured U.S. Aid Worker
MOSCOW, Jan 28 (News Agencies) - Russian forces said on Sunday that a ransom demand for the release of U.S. aid worker Kenny Gluck - abducted in Chechnya on January 9th - has been issued by his kidnappers, ITAR-TASS reported.
But General Valery Baranov, head of Russian forces in the northern Caucus, said that his forces were not mediating in the negotiations.
Baranov said that the contacts concerning Gluck had nothing to do with Russian forces, and refused to say who had been carrying out the talks, but insisted that Russia was continuing with efforts to locate him.
According to Baranov, Russia has already made preliminary contact with a Chechen leader known as Yakub in its efforts to free the abducted Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF, Doctors Without Borders) volunteer.
"The rebels are in the situation where they can go to the point of killing him and the international community will realize that they really are just bandits," Baranov added.
Russia's interior minister recently insisted that a Chechen commander called Khattab, who fought alongside pro-independence separatists, was holding Gluck in the south of the breakaway republic.
The state prosecutor in Chechnya, Vsevolod Chernov, on Saturday said that a suspect believed to be involved with Gluck's abduction had been arrested.
The pro-independence Chechen presidency headed by Aslan Maskhadov has denied any responsibility for the abduction, accusing bodyguards of the pro-Russian Chechen administration led by Akhmad Kadyrov of kidnapping Gluck.
