Andrei Sakharov Foundation Forums

I wholeheartedly support the statement of Alexander Haig, Zbigniew Brzezinski, and Max Kampelman, all of whom I greatly respect, announcing the creation of an American Committee for Chechnya. I thank them for their invitation to participate in its work, even though I am not an American citizen. I agree with all the points of the Committee's Founding Declaration, and I am confident that many human rights organizations, disturbed by events in Chechnya, will collaborate with the Committee.I believe that

1.

• First of all, the Committee should work with the UN, the OSCE, the Council of Europe, and the European Parliament to gain the Russian government's agreement to stationing of permanent observers and representatives of humanitarian organizations throughout the entire region of Chechnya which is under the control of the Russian army. I consider this a realistic demand if the international organizatons I have listed will not limit themselves to verbal scolding. The current tendency to shift the Russian government's powers to the security forces and the military poses no less of a danger to the international community than the Austrian political situation. Only the presence of international observers can protect Chechnya's population from so-called "cleansing," arbitrary executions and looting. In particular, it is important that representative of the International Committee of the Red Cross be allowed to inspect the conditions of detention in "filtration camps." A refusal to give permission for the presence of international observers should lead to the presumption that Russia is hiding not only gross violations of human rights and mass slaughter from bombing and shelling, but also continuing crimes against humanity and genocide. The organization of a special information center (called the Russian Information Center, an imitation of Stalin's Soviet Information Bureau), the refusal to allow visits to the war zone by independent correspondents, and the disappearance a month ago of Radio Liberty correspondent Andrei Babitsky with the later claim that he had been detained and exchanged for Russian POWs heighten the fears I have expressed above.

2.

• All humanitarian assistance for Chechnya should be distributed by the staff of international humanitarian organizations or under their direct supervision. If it becomes possible in the future for international financial institutions to provide assistance for the reconstruction of Chechnya, such assistance should bypass Russian organizations, and be sent directly to Chechnya for specific projects, in the first place, projects connected with health services. Such assistance should also be monitored by international observers.

During the last six years, in the course of two ferocious wars, the Chechen population has been cut almost in half. If the international community does not protect those Chechens who are still alive, we will all share in the guilt for this crime against humanity √ a crime of the 21st Century!February 14, 2000Elena Bonner