Al Qaeda among the Chechens

[ Homepage ] [ Deism ] [ Christianity in America ] [ Debunking Islam ]
[ Article List ] [ Sullivan County, TN ] [ Bristol VA/TN ]

Al Qaeda among the Chechens

BESLAN, RUSSIA - Among the wilted flowers brought to celebrate the first day of classes in the now blackened wreckage of Beslan's School No. 1 are the abundant signs of a sophisticated terror operation. That evidence is sparking a re-examination of the long-standing Chechen links to Al Qaeda.

"They were so well trained - the highest level," says Oleg Tedeyev, deputy chief of a local police unit, who was involved in the battle Friday that freed more than 700 people, and officially left 338 dead, half of them children. In recent months, radical Islamist Chechen leaders such as Shamil Basayev, along with Osama bin Laden, have been "clear" about wanting to "set Russia on fire," says Michael Radu, a terrorism expert at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia. "This is not an Al Qaeda operation: These are autonomous groups," he says. "It's not like bin Laden wrote the checks. But they are synchronized ideologically and strategically." Survivors say the 30-odd attackers were mostly Russian-speaking Chechens. But as families in this small town near Chechnya bury their dead Monday, they described the end of the saga as one in which both the hostage-takers and Russian special forces were caught off guard by an accidental explosion in the gymnasium, which sparked a lethal firefight and hostage escape.

Still officials here say the evidence suggests a complex operation and the kind of preparation once given in the Al Qaeda training camps of Afghanistan. When officials entered the school building after the battle, they found syringes. The hostage-takers weren't addicts, but they were taking drugs "to keep them awake," says Mr. Tedeyev, whose own two children escaped as the school was seized. "As a military man, I was surprised how they could position themselves so well. In minutes, in seconds, they understood [the place]. It wasn't the first time they were here."

In the smoldering school, though swept by Russian intelligence and security services, a single singed wire still hangs from a charred basketball hoop - testifying to the web of explosives rigged from the ceiling and walls of the gymnasium, where more than 1,200 agonized hostages were held for three days. A shredded black belt and bloodied camouflage utility vest lies in the hall next to the cafeteria, where a female suicide bomber detonated herself. And in the library, chunks of the floor have been hacked away to reveal hiding spaces, where the Chechen separatists had stored ammunition and explosives, perhaps building the stockpile for several months, during summer renovation work. Russian media reports that as many as 10 of the attackers were Arab have also raised questions about the link with Islamic militant groups.

"I think it's Al Qaeda. I think it's Saudi Arabia, Arabs, and possibly Afghan terrorists - and terrorists who are here in Russia as well," says Soslan Sikoyev, the deputy interior minister for North Ossetia, who has offered to resign for failing to prevent the crisis. He has been kidnapped twice himself by militants in past years.

But he adds tiredly, "It doesn't matter what nationalities they are ... because they have brought so much grief." An Al Qaeda-connected group calling itself the Islambouli Brigades, which has been active in Pakistan, claimed responsibility for both the simultaneous downing of two passenger jets on Aug. 24, that left 90 dead, and a suicide bomb in Moscow on August 31 that killed ten more.

Ties between Chechen radicals and Al Qaeda stretch back to the first Chechen war (1994-1996). A radical element - spurred by would-be clerics who traveled to Saudi Arabia to learn about the Salafi fundamentalist strain of Islam - began to develop in the late 1990s. By 1999, when Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev invaded Russian territory in Dagestan - prompting a second war - it became clear that Islamic radicals dominated Chechen rebel groups.

"Chechnya began to attract [Al Qaeda] emissaries, adventurers, and finances," says Alexander Iskandaryan, head of the Center for Caucasian Studies in Yerevan, Armenia. "After 1999, the radical tendency grew strong, and became more internationalized." This second war burns on, and has two parts: guerrilla warfare and terrorist acts, says Mr. Iskandarian. "Over the last month, we've seen a considerable growth of the second component, terrorism." "Russian policy in the Caucasus in the last 10 years helped a lot to separate the Caucasus from Russia," he says. "Ideology is being generated against Russia - Islamization is growing. There are more calls for sharia law, not only by radicals, but by average Muslims."

North Ossetia, historically the only pro-Russian, Christian portion of the North Caucasus - which has long-held grudges against Muslim Ingush and Chechens - may have been seen as an ideal target to spark havoc here. "A very sophisticated group stands behind this - I don't want to single out Al Qaeda; there may be unexpected sources," says Vitaly Shlykov, an independent military analyst in Moscow. "There are some [Chechen] contacts with Al Qaeda, but to operate in real time? I'm doubtful [Chechens] receive orders and act on them. The guidance is more ideological."

Many of residents of Beslan say they are convinced that their Ingush and Chechen neighbors are to blame, and that foreign operatives would have had a hard time infiltrating in any numbers. "Of course, there was someone behind them - they were speaking on mobile phones; they had their bosses," says Tamik Granikov, a local builder, referring to people outside Beslan but not foreigners. Russian officials say they have arrested three men on suspicion of involvement, possibly by tracing phone calls. When the crisis began, Mr. Granikov says, "we were worried about whether the renovation work was used as a cover. They never could have brought so many grenades and bullets [on the day of the attack]."

Tedeyev, the police officer - whose house is so close to the school that two bullets came through his windows - says he saw the body of a black foreigner. He also says that this group learned from past terrorist mistakes. They carried gas masks and broke windows to prevent being gassed like the Chechen separatists who took over the Dubrovka Theater while the play "Nord-Ost" was being performed in October 2002. "It seems they studied all the cases, from the Nord-Ost to those in the US," says Tedeyev. "So it becomes more difficult for the state to fight terror. TV shows everything the Spetnatz [special forces] does. We seem to teach [terrorists] ourselves, and then we suffer for it."

Above extracts from September 07, 2004 edition - http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0907/p01s02-woeu.html

Russian Tragedy Causes Rift Among Rebels

Fox News

Saturday, September 11, 2004

MOSCOW — The horrific school hostage seizure has caused a rift among Chechen rebels, Russian officials claimed Saturday. And in an effort to exploit that division, authorities said insurgents can get the $10 million reward offered for information about their top warlords.

The reward offer was announced earlier in the week for information about Chechen rebel leaders Shamil Basayev and Aslan Maskhadov. Federal Security Service Maj.-Gen. Ilya Shabalkin underlined on Saturday that rebels were eligible for the money.

Officials say Chechens were among the 11 attackers who have been identified, and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Friday the hostage-taking was directed by Basayev — the most notorious of the warlords leading Chechen rebels who have been fighting Russian forces for five years.

Lavrov said Maskhadov, Chechnya's president from 1996-99, was also connected with the hostage-taking.

The clarification about the reward by Shabalkin, a spokesman for the Russian forces' Chechnya operations, appeared to be aimed at exploiting reported dissension in the fighters' ranks over taking over the school in the Northern Ossetian city of Beslan (search).

After the hostage-taking ended Sept. 3 in a frenzy of shooting and explosions and the deaths of at least 330 people, news accounts cited former hostages as saying that some of the raiders argued with their leader once they found out their mission was to seize children as hostages.

The Left and Radical Islam:

Islam, Saudi Arabia, and Beslan:

Theo van Gogh and Education By Murder in Holland
Click here to find out about the Danish Cartoon Jihad

Theo Van Gogh Murder and Islam

Also see: Beslan Child Slaughter
Responses to Ed Barlow of Creating the Future

Homepage

Visitors since
March 2002