Moscow, May 16: Vladimir Putin is ready to launch a "third war" on Chechnya, a Russian rights group said today following the Russian President's vow to crush rebel resistance in the breakaway republic once and for all. Putin's uncompromising state-of-the-union speech Friday "leaves no doubt about his determination to wage a third war on the martyred republic," for human rights said in a statement. The group also said recent suicide attacks showed that rebel resistance had taken "a new form", likening it to Palestinian extremist tactics.
"It is the beginning of suicide attacks akin to those of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It is clear that new groups will join the ranks" of veteran Chechen rebels, the non-government organization said.
Two suicide attacks within days of one another this week killed at least 87 people in the southern republic, where separatists have battled federal forces during a first war from December 1994 to late 1996, and again since October 1999, when Moscow sent troops back in. Putin first offered an amnesty for rebels yesterday, then made a vow to see the battle out to the end in his speech.
"We will certainly finish this task. People in Chechnya will live a normal, civilised life," he said.
For human rights criticized Moscow's refusal to negotiate with Aslan Maskhadov, who was elected Chechen president after the first war in 1996 but was later disavowed by Moscow as a terrorist. Bureau Report