AZERBAIJAN: SON OF SLAIN CHECHEN LEADER ASLAN MASKHADOV SAYS FIGHT FOR INDEPENDENCE WILL CONTINUE

Record ID: 218564

  • Title: AZERBAIJAN: SON OF SLAIN CHECHEN LEADER ASLAN MASKHADOV SAYS FIGHT FOR INDEPENDENCE WILL CONTINUE
  • Date: 10th March 2005
  • Summary: (W4) BAKU, AZERBAIJAN (MARCH 9, 2005) (REUTERS) 1. GV OVER BAKU SKYLINE; SLV PEOPLE IN STREET 0.12 2. MV INTERIOR OF ROOM, ANZOR MASKHADOV SON OF CHECHEN REBEL LEADER ASLAN MASKHADOV IN ROOM WITH OTHER PEOPLE 0.20 3. (SOUNDBITE) (Russian) ANZOR MASKHADOV, SAYING: "The (Russian) special forces were negotiating with the president (former Chec
  • Embargoed: 25th March 2005 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: BAKU, AZERBAIJAN
  • Country: Azerbaijan
  • Reuters ID: LVA8AK4PHX37H4RDZRQUROLBITMM
  • Story Text: Maskhadov's son says Chechnya's fight for
    independence will continue.

    The son of the slain Chechen leader promised on
    Wednesday (March 9, 2005) to continue his father's work and
    achieve Chechnya's goal of independence.

    "I am 29, and I always believed my father and what he
    did. And so I can say that everything will continue; I will
    trying to achieve our goal (of independence). I will be
    faithfully following my father's way," said Aznor
    Maskhadov.

    Speaking to reporters in the Azerbaijan capital Baku,
    Aznor said his father, Aslan Maskhadov, had refused to
    surrender to Russian special forces who had surrounded him
    in a village north of the capital Grozny on Tuesday (March
    8).

    "The (Russian) special forces were negotiating with the
    president (former Chechen president and rebel chief Aslan
    Maskhadov), and offered him to surrender. I know my father
    very well and he would never have accepted such a thing and
    would never betray the Chechen people; so he refused (to
    surrender). Then, as far as I can analyse, from seeing the
    video, listening to what people have been saying and
    listening to the reports, I can say my father weighed up
    the circumstances and he probably thought that it would be
    better if he would die alone and let those three (his
    bodyguards) stay alive. So somehow must have negotiated for
    his bodyguards' to stay alive and stayed on to fight; this
    is how he died," said Aznor Maskhadov.

    Anor and Maskhadov's wife are living as refugees in
    Azerbaijan.

    Chechen rebels on Wednesday vowed to press ahead with
    their fight for independence after the death of guerrilla
    chief Aslan Maskhadov amid speculation the separatist leadership
    might now fall into more violent hands.

    Analysts said feared warlord Shamil Basayev, who has
    claimed responsibility for some of the worst acts of
    violence in Russia, including last year's bloody attack on
    the school in Beslan, might now take over at the helm of
    the Chechen resistance.

    Aslan Maskhadov's death provided a much-needed triumph
    for President Vladimir Putin who has suffered numerous
    setbacks in pursuing hardline policies in the Muslim North
    Caucasus territory.

    His five years in power have been marked by deadly
    Chechen suicide bomb attacks in Moscow, a mass
    hostage-taking at a theatre that cost the lives of 129
    hostages and the Beslan massacre in southern Russia in
    which more than 320 people, half of them children, were
    killed.

    But some analysts said the death of Maskhadov, a former
    Soviet army colonel who enjoyed the legitimacy of being
    democratically elected president of Chechnya in 1997,
    removed a moderate who could have negotiated peace with the
    Kremlin.

    The veteran leader had often invited Moscow to hold
    talks with him, saying a peaceful solution to a conflict
    that has killed tens of thousands of people in the past 10
    years could be worked out in minutes.

    Moscow refused, saying it did not negotiate with
    terrorists.

    Commentators speculated that the choice to succeed
    Maskhadov was between Basayev or Doku Umarov, another
    hardline commander of the rebels' "south western front" who
    has been linked by security forces to several bloody
    attacks including Beslan.

    "Terror will only increase if either of these comes to
    power," Kommersant daily said in a commentary.

    The heavily bearded Basayev, who lost a foot after
    treading on a mine, has been behind many of the sensational
    Chechen rebel operations and is the most notorious figure
    in Russia.

    He claimed responsibility for organising the Beslan
    bloodbath and two suicide bomb attacks that downed two
    passenger planes over Russia with the deaths of 90 people.

    In an interview with Britain's Channel 4, aired last
    month, Basayev said he considered all Russian civilians to
    be legitimate targets.

    Maskhadov, who denied any link to Beslan despite
    accusations of involvement by Russian security forces, said
    Basayev would go on trial for the school massacre after the
    conflict was over.

    Prosecutors formally identified the body as Maskhadov's
    after an examination, Itar-Tass news agency reported.


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