By Maarten Rottschäfer for UNPO

On May 9 2005, a debate on future scenarios for Chechnya was held at the Dutch Amnesty International headquarters in Amsterdam. Participants of the panel discussion were chairman Lars van Troost, who is head of external relations at Amnesty Netherlands, Islam Bashirov Member of UNPO and representative of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria and Egbert Wesselink from Pax Christi Netherlands. Invited, but not present was the representative of the Russian embassy in the Netherlands.

Egbert Wesselink opened the discussion with an analysis of the news coming from Chechnya on May 9. With this he showed that the conflict was very complicated because of the many different players involved. He had a very pessimistic view on future solutions because of the impossible demand of full independence from the Government of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria. On the other hand he pointed out that the Russians are not putting an effort to end the conflict. They should come forward to the demands of the Chechens. “They don’t give the Chechen people any reason to stay in the Russian Federation” he said. This should be the first step in ending the conflict. Because of the lack of control by the government of Chechnya and the government of the Republic of Ichkeria over the armed rebels, it is difficult for them to make the first step towards a peace plan.

Islam Bashirov presented the four step peace plan from the government of the Republic of Ichkeria. The aim of this peace plan is to provide a roadmap towards peace and full independence. Their first objective is a conditional independence under an international administration. The first step should be negotiations with all parties involved without any preceding demands. The outcome of these negotiations will be a peace plan presented to the Security Council of the United Nations. The second step will be a resolution of the Security Council of the United Nations on the Russian-Chechen conflict. Part of this resolution should be the commitment of the International Community to send a peace force to secure peace in the region. This together with the withdrawal of Russian forces is step three. The last step will be a transitional period where the international peace force guarantees security and UN officials run the administration. After this transitional period an independent Chechen Republic will be established.

After Bashirov’s presentation a lively discussion started involving the audience. Questions were raised about the support for a North Caucasian Federation and the involvement of Arab/Islamist countries in the conflict. Bashirov stated that there is no support for the almost century old plan for a North Caucasian Federation. He also minimized the involvement of Arab/Islamist countries. No financial or moral support is coming from these countries. To illustrate this point Wesselink presented examples of constant complaints by rebel leader Basayev. The Chechen Republic of Ichkeria is avoiding Arab/Islamist involvement because of the lack of democratic values in these countries. “One of the important reasons to why we seek support in Europe”, Bashirov, says. “Is because we seek these democratic values in order to create a sustainable peace and hope to find the much needed support of the International Community” The debate ended with the wish expressed by the speakers, as well as the audience, that more involvement of the International Community is a prerequisite for peace.