AZERBAIJAN: FAMILY OF SLAIN CHECHEN REBEL LEADER ASLAN MASKHADOV ASK RUSSIA TO RETURN HIS BODY

Record ID: 218572

  • Title: AZERBAIJAN: FAMILY OF SLAIN CHECHEN REBEL LEADER ASLAN MASKHADOV ASK RUSSIA TO RETURN HIS BODY
  • Date: 12th March 2005
  • Summary: BAKU, AZERBAIJAN (MARCH 10, 2005) (REUTERS) 1. SLV MEN ARRIVING TO EXPRESS CONDOLENCES TO FAMILY 0.03 2. MV MALE MEMBERS OF MASKHADOV'S FAMILY MEMBERS IN COURT YARD; MASKHADOV'S FAMILY MEMBERS ACCEPTING CONDOLENCES; ANZOR MASKHADOV, SON OF CHECHEN REBEL LEADER ASLAN MASKAHDOV IN COURT YARD (4 SHOTS) 0.34 3. (SOUNDBITE)(Russian) ANZOR MASKHA
  • Embargoed: 27th March 2005 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: BAKU, AZERBAIJAN
  • Country: Azerbaijan
  • Reuters ID: LVA6GA3D6XH3A9RSPK0HBH9QZOMS
  • Story Text: Family of slain Chechen rebel leader ask Russia to
    give his body back; appeal for help from the international
    community.

    The son of Aslan Maskhadov, the Chechen guerrilla chief and former
    president of Russia's war-torn Chechen republic killed by Russian security
    forces, said on Thursday (March 10) that Russia should hand over the body of
    his father to relatives so they can give him a burial.

    Maskhadov, 53, was killed on Tuesday when the FSB security service blew
    up the reinforced cellar where he was hiding in the Chechen village of
    Tolstoy-Yurt, officials said.

    Russian forces, which have been fighting a 10-year separatist
    insurgency in Chechnya, are holding Maskhadov's body and plan to bury it in an
    undisclosed location, saying the rebel leader is not entitled to a proper
    funeral.

    His body is being held at an army base, according to media reports.

    "Legislation does not provide for the surrender of bodies of dead
    terrorists to relatives," Interfax news agency quoted deputy prosecutor
    Nikolai Shepel as saying.

    Maskhadov's widow, Kusama, his daughter Fatima and son Aznor, have
    lived in the Azerbaijan capital Baku for almost a year, where a small Chechen
    community exists.

    "They (Russians) say that as if a law exists which prohibits the
    (return of a) body of a so-called terrorist to the relatives; well let them
    prove that he (Aslan Maskhadov) was a terrorist and then I can prove the
    opposite," said Aznor Maskahdov.

    Mourners gathered at the family home on Thursday (March 10) where the
    family have been holding a three-day memorial service.

    Anzor flatly rejected Russian reference to his father as a
    "terrorist".

    "The whole world knows that he was not a terrorist; he was against
    war and until his last breath, he was offering peace to Russian side. Despite
    all the violence he saw directed against Chechens, he kept offering a peace
    deal. How is it possible to call such a man a terrorist?," Aznor
    Maskhadov told reporters.

    A relative of the Maskhadov's appealed to the international community
    to help the family get back Maskhadov's body.

    "Maskhadov's family and close relatives are appealing to the
    international community, politicians, and world leaders to help us to get our
    president's body. I as a close relative want to ask the international
    community and world leaders to help us arrange an adequate burial for
    Maskhadov," said Rakhman Dushuev.

    Chechnya's separatists, who are split between rival warlords, have not
    said who will succeed Maskhadov as leader.

    But Shamil Basayev, a feared warlord responsible for some of the worst
    acts of violence in Russia including the Beslan school massacre, had even
    before Maskhadov's death emerged as the most powerful rebel figure.

    Basayev said in a statement posted on a separatist Web site that under
    Chechen law, Abdul Kalim, a little-known cleric who heads the rebels' Islamic
    court, will take over as caretaker leader until elections are held. Russian
    newspapers said at least two of Maskhadov's envoys abroad confirmed this.

    But the outlawed rebel Chechen government, which has distanced itself
    from Basayev's more bloody attacks on Russian targets, made no mention of the
    cleric in a statement overnight.

    The rebels' principal overseas representative, the London-based Akhmed
    Zakayev, has not said anything either.

    Maskhadov's death provided a badly-needed triumph for Russian President
    Vladimir Putin, whose policy of "rubbing out" the separatists has
    been met with vicious attacks, among them the September 2004 Beslan siege in
    which at least 320 people, half of them children, were killed.

    But Maskhadov had offered peace talks with Moscow and was was seen as a
    relative moderate. Commentators say that with his death, the chances have
    receded of a negotiated end to the 10-year Chechen war.


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