Chechen terror leader offers peace for independence

Radical Chechen rebel leader Shamil Basayev purportedly took responsibility today for a recent series of deadly terrorist attacks in Russia, but put the ultimate blame for the massacre of more than 330 people held hostage in a school on Russian President Vladimir Putin.

In a letter posted today on the Kavkaz-Centre website, Basayev said he had sent a letter to Putin proposing ”independence (for Chechnya) in exchange for security”.

It was impossible to confirm whether the letter was genuine, but the website is considered a mouthpiece for Basayev and his previous claims of responsibility have appeared there.

He said that if Russia withdrew its troops, Chechnya would neither support nor finance groups fighting Russia, and ”we can guarantee that all of Russia’s Muslims refrain from armed methods of struggle against the Russian Federation, at least for 10-15 years, on condition that freedom of religion (as is guaranteed in the Russian Federation) be respected”.

Basayev said his band was responsible for an August explosion at a bus stop outside Moscow, the near-simultaneous bombings of two planes the same night, a suicide bombing outside a Moscow subway station a week later, and the school hostage-taking in Beslan that ended in a hail of gunfire and explosions. More than 430 people have been killed in the attacks.

“A terrible tragedy occurred in the city of Beslan. The Kremlin vampire destroyed and wounded 1,000 children and adults, giving the order to storm the school for the sake of imperial ambitions and the preservation of his own throne,” Basayev wrote.