A Dirty War
Anna Politkovskaya
Language: English
Pages: 265
ISBN: B00HRFATW0
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
The Chechen War was supposed to be over in 1996 after the first Yeltsin campaign, but in the summer of 1999, the new Putin government decided, in their own words, to 'do the job properly'. Before all the bodies of those who had died in the first campaign had been located or identified, many more thousands would be slaughtered in another round of fighting.
The first account to be written by a Russian woman, A Dirty War is an edgy and intense study of a conflict that shows no sign of being resolved. Exasperated by the Russian government's attempt to manipulate media coverage of the war, journalist Anna Politkovskaya undertook to go to Chechnya, to make regular reports and keep events in the public eye.
In a series of despatches from July 1999 to January 2001 she vividly describes the atrocities and abuses of war, whether it be the corruption endemic in post-Communist Russia, in particular the government and the military, or the spurious arguments and abominable behaviour of the Chechen authorities. In these courageous reports, Politkovskaya excoriates male stupidity and brutality on both sides of the conflict and interviews the civilians whose homes and communities have been laid waste, leaving them nowhere to live, and nothing and no one to believe in.
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for the Southern Area. Khattab Alias of Saudi-born citizen fighting in Chechnya since February 1995. Veteran of Afghanistan, he brought with him mujahedin, self-professed Wahhabis, of Saudi and North African origin. Kovalyov, Sergei (b.1930) Veteran human rights activist. In prison camps and internal exile from 1974 to 1984; member of every Russian parliament since 1990. He stood down in 1999. Presidential human rights commissioner 1993–6 and most prominent critic of first war; spent winter of
cool heads and warm feet. 37 See the April 2000 Human Rights Watch report "No Happiness Remains" (www.hrw.org). 38 Since 1993, 12 December is marked as the day on which independent, post-Communist Russia adopted its new Constitution. 39 See Chapter 8, "Camp Guards". 40 In 1945 at the end of the war the male Chechens who had fought the Germans did not take part in victory parades (even the 132 among them who as Heroes of the Soviet Union had won the ultimate accolade for their bravery) but
argument: "Let whatever will happen, happen. We might as well die there as here." Obstacle No 2 to their return is that they also want to avoid the unparalleled pillaging and humiliations that living with the federal forces would bring. Chechnya has been handed over to the "victors" for plunder and pillage and the generals are wallowing, with enjoyment, in these mediaeval practices. Their only disappointment now, it would seem, is that most of the villages are half-empty and there are too few
Chechnya with a hired driver and travel freely. The two sides were often extraordinarily close; I once took tea with the rebel Chechen vice– president – a man with an arrest warrant on his head in Moscow – less than a mile from a Russian checkpoint. And ordinary Chechen villagers were unfailingly warm and helpful to Western reporters. Most had no political affiliation, although almost all were full of hatred against the Russian invader. They took us in without a moment's thought, mindless of the
August 2000 Kasim Getiev's eyes reflect his horror. He is both director of School No 2 in Chiri-Yurt (Shali district) and head of the town electoral commission. "We are in a total state of shock," he says. "The night's events have stunned us all." It is difficult to meet his distracted gaze: his eyes are those of a tormented and persecuted man. "To be honest, what kind of elections can you hold immediately after a battle? You must understand . . ." It is midday, 19 August, twelve hours before