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OOh, a little white=washing here....Lenta.ru says the terrorists called Turkey, specifically.
Dear Editor:
In Michael Wines' article, "At Least 67 Captives and 50 Chechens Die in Moscow Siege" of October 27, 2002, he repeatedly called the terrorists "guerillas," except for one paragraph wherein he called them "a band of 50 Chechen guerrillas." The truth, however, is they were terrorists.
I find Mr. Wines' choice of words especially "interesting" because, when I read an article in The Telegraph today by Christina Lamb and Ben Aris, for example, they wrote that "a senior Western diplomat said, ‘There were definitely Arab terrorists in the building with links to al-Qa'eda.' According, also, to The Telegraph, "the Russians will now want to know how much help the Chechens received from bin Laden's organisation." It would be incredulous to believe that Mr. Wines overlooked this "little" piece of information.
My opinion: at least The Telegraph prints the truth, in all its ugliness.
I saw a previous thread remarking that Russia has not learned a
lesson because they still support Iranian terrorists. The smugness
of Americans whose government continues to support Saudia
Arabia, the source of our own disaster, 9/11, is revolting.
Muslims build an Islamic superstate near Russia
Religion Today (11.11.1999)
/ HRWF International Secretariat (18.11.1999) - Website: http://www.hrwf.net -
Email: info@hrwf.net
- Islamic fundamentalists are waging war to create a Muslim superstate on Russia's border, sources say. The rebels hope to link with Islamic groups in Dagestan, overthrow the government there, and create a combined Islamic state bordering the Caspian Sea, sources told Religion Today.
Islamic rebels in Chechnya invaded neighboring Dagestan in August, touching off a war with Russia, their neighbor to the north and a historically Christian nation. Russia's Sept. 5 military offensive incited the rebels to terrorism, and they blew up several apartment buildings in Russian cities, news reports said.Middle Eastern nations and Muslim global terrorist Osama bin Laden are supplying the rebels with arms and training, some believe. Muslim leaders Shamil Basayev and Khattab in Chechnya were with bin Laden when he aided the Islamic Taliban in Afghanistan, Prism magazine said. The two "are Arabs - born in the Middle East. They are transplants," Sharon Linzey of George Fox University told Religion Today. She taught sociology and religion at Moscow State University in 1992.
Basayev has claimed responsibility for the attacks on the apartment buildings, and Chechen rebels who conducted terrorist attacks in neighboring Georgia are believed to have been trained by bin Laden operatives in Pakistan, Prism said. While there is evidence that bin Laden is involved in the conflict, the Russian government may be overstating his influence to justify its strong counterattacks, the magazine said
Russia has oppressed traditionally Muslim Chechnya for centuries. Religious, ethnic, and racial conflicts are at the heart of the problem, Linzey said. Russians hold Chechens in disdain, regarding them as lawless bandits, she said."junction of the Christian and Muslim worlds," Prism said. Chechnya is at the northeastern end of the Caucasus Mountains, which stretch from the Black Sea to the Caspian Sea separating Christian Europe from the Middle East. The Muslim nations of Turkey, Iran, and Iraq are only a few hundred miles from Grozny, the Chechen capital.
Islamic nations to the south want the historically Muslim region to return to its roots. This is happening all along the southern border of the former Soviet Union," Peter Deyneka of Russian Ministries told Religion Today. "There is a lot of infiltration from Muslim activists, and that is troublesome for the future."
An Islamic resurgence in Chechnya began after the fall of the Soviet Union. The atheistic Soviet government persecuted Muslims and Christians, and the traditionally Islamic country lost touch with its Islamic roots, Linzey said. Chechens seeking to re-establish their cultural identity began rediscovering Islam in the early 1990s, she said.
Muslim missionaries from the Middle East began arriving in many of the former Soviet republics in Central Asia and the Caucasus region after the fall of communism, Prism said. Arab countries financed the construction of mosques and the printing and distribution of copies of the Koran. "There was a significant difference in the visibility of Islam in a short period of time," a representative of a ministry to Dagestan said.
Christians have been kidnapped, tortured, and killed in the region. At least three leaders of Grozny Baptist Church were killed in the past year, Compass Direct News said. Other members of the church have been raped and held for ransom, and most have fled from the country, it said. Eight leaders from Grozny Orthodox Church of St. Michael the Archangel were kidnapped in recent months, Compass said.
Muslim radicals kidnapped American missionary Herbert Gregg in 1998, demanded a ransom, and cut off one of his fingers, Compass said. Gregg, who was released after 230 days of captivity, said his captors often talked of taking him to a "killing camp" in the mountains where Christians are executed. Christians continue to minister in the Caucasus region. Two regional church-planting centers sponsored by Russian Ministries are based in the area, and Christians are ministering to refugees from the Chechen war, Deyneka said. A church of about 50 members meets in Dagestan and its leaders recently attended a conference in a "safe area" to learn ministry skills and obtain theological training, the ministry representative to Dagestan said.