On 9 May Russia’s president Vladimir Putin feelingly held out his hand to a rather lost young man dressed in sports clothing. This was none other than the son of Akhmad Kadyrov, who had just been killed in an explosion at the Dinamo sports stadium in Grozny. Two days later Putin, for the first time in four years, took himself off to Chechnya, in order to present Kadyrov’s relatives with his posthumous medal “Hero of Russia” and offer his condolences. On 14 May, the Republican administration passed a resolution on compensating victims of the fatal explosion at the Dinamo stadium. Relatives of the dead, according to the administration, would receive 114,200 roubles and an additional 200,000 for material assistance and compensatory payments for burying the victims; those badly injured or maimed would be paid up to 50,000; lightly injured people 15,000.

One month earlier, in a mountain hamlet some 50 kilometres from Grozny called Rigahoy, subordinates of Supreme Commander-in-Chief Vladimir Putin’s Russian Armed Forces killed five children aged between 9 months and 5 years, along with their mother. However, not one word of sympathy found its way either from the president or the generals to the father who somehow had survived. And compensation was not offered by anyone.

Spring 2004 has hardly been any different in the mountains of southern Chechnya to the past. Notwithstanding claims by the authorities that the situation is “stabilising”, the war continues. Russian helicopter-gunships and bombers almost daily proceed with dumping their deadly freight over the thickly forested Black Mountains of southern Chechnya. From time to time bombs explode on the outskirts of the mountain villages.

Above the hamlet of Rigahoy, located in the Vedeno administrative region, as elsewhere in the Chechen mountains, military airplanes fly low: this supposedly to lessen the risk of being hit by Partisan fire. And each time the father-of-six Imar-Ali Damaev would tell his wife to take the children out into the street, thus to indicate to the pilots that they should beware of children. However, on 8 May, his wife did not manage to get out in time. The aircraft bombed the Damaev home. Later on, investigators from the military prosecutor identified twelve craters in and around the destroyed Damaev family home: six caused by bombs, and six by missiles. The dead were Maidat Tsintsaeva (aged 30); 5-year old Dzhanasi; Zharadit (4); Umar-Hazhi (2); and Zara & Zura (9 months).

The mother had tried to save her children by covering them with her own body: when the dead were dug out of the ruins of the house, all except Zara lay in their mother’s dead embrace. The father saw this image from the nearby graveyard where he had gone shortly before the tragedy occurred. The older son, in his first year at school, found out about it several hours later on returning from school, which was located in a different village.

On 13 April the murder of the infants and mother was brought to public attention by Memorial, the Russian human rights organisation. And straightaway the Ministry of Defence started to lie. The Air Force Command denied any involvement in the affair. Furthermore, based on information from the Military Prosecutor, the Russian media spread information that the family apparently had been killed by a land mine exploding, the method of attack favoured by the Chechen rebels. There was also an unmistakable hint that the family itself had planted the land mine: thus their effectively being labelled as separatists.

On the same day as Memorial exposed the affair, members of the Military Prosecutor, along with their namesakes from the Vedeno Public Prosecutor, were flown to the village by helicopter. After a superficial view of the sight of the attack, they declared that a “land mine had exploded”, and there were no “foundations to warrant the opening of a criminal investigation” (as if the violent death of a mother and five children, whatever the circumstances, were not reason enough!).

However, on the scene of the crime were unmistakable clues proving the guilt of the Russian pilot-terrorists. These were the many splinters caused by the exploding bombs, the deep bomb craters, and most importantly a tail section of a missile with factory number 350F 5-90.

Only on 16 April, more than a week after the tragic event, did the military prosecutor, under pressure from the press and the Republican administration, finally open Criminal Investigation Nr. 34/00/0015-04 concerning a crime covered by Article 109 of the Russian Law: causing death by carelessness.

In front of me lies a copy of the decision to close a different Criminal Investigation, Nr. 29/00/0004-03, signed by senior inspector of the Main Military Prosecutor Colonel Savitsky. The case concerns the following. In the night of 13 August 2002, four shells of type OF-25, calibre 152 milimetres, were fired from military point 23132 at the Chechen regional centre of Shali. The second of the four shells (the following quoted from the document) …“having torn into the house belonging to Aslambek Edilkhanov…destroyed it, and the two juvenile sisters Rita and Malika Gabarova were thrown across the room by the force of the blast and were buried (under the ceiling and other building material). Both died of asphyxiation. The mother of the dead girls Esita Edilkhanova received fatal injuries to her brain…citizen Zaurbek Edilkhanov, born 1925, was buried by a part of a collapsed wall. As a result he received fatal head injuries.

“The third shell fell on School Road...and a ricochet, after tearing off part of citizen Salaudi Dauev’s foot, disintegrated on hitting a metal fence. People hastening to the aid of the family Edilkhanov suffered. Salaudi Dauev had an amputation and suffered other shrapnel wounds. On 15 August 2002 Dauev died in a regional hospital as a result of post-traumatic shock, cardiovascular complications and kidney failure. Vahit Voserkhanov received numerous shrapnel injuries…Khomaid Ilyasov received many shrapnel injuries…Zhalaud Ilyasov received shrapnel injuries to the spine.

“The fourth shell to hit the Edilkhanov family home completely destroyed it, and part of the Ilyasov home…four people suffered as a result of their trying to free the Gabarova sisters.

The result of the shelling was three corpses (including the two young girls), eight injured (one crippled for life), and two children with serious psychological disturbances.

And here after two investigations the “fair” punishment for those behind the killing: the commander of SAU 226 was presented by the military prosecutor with “severe” accusations of infringement of the right to use weapons (part 3 page 349 of Russian statute); and the commander of the platoon the same “severe” accusations of negligence (part 2 page 293 Russian statute). Both were amnestied according to a decision by the Russian state Duma concerning “The announcement of amnesty in connection with acceptance of the constitution of the Chechen Republic” (remember how the Duma deputies greedily discussed how the amnesty would return Chechen rebels to civilian life?). And in the decision to amnesty the two Russian servicemen, which the public prosecutor kindly dispatched to the parents of the killed girls and other victims, the names of the amnestied murderers were not given - in the document they pass under the letters "I" and "O". That God forbid somebody from the families of the victims inadvertently disturb the carefree life of the defenders of the Fatherland! In June 2003 the victims submitted claims for material and personal damage. The matter has so far not made it to court, and almost certainly never will. And as the reader has probably already guessed, none of the victims received any condolences from the Kremlin.

One hardly needs to doubt the affair of the five dead children and their mother in Rigahoy will end any differently: in the best case scenario the surviving, grieving father will receive a note that pilots A and B admitted negligence and have received a conditional sentence…

… However, in recent times those accused of similar crimes in general neither have to worry about losing their liberty nor their future career. Russian legal know-how has appeared: to blame the illegal actions on the orders given by the commander above. Thus this commander refers to the order from his commander, and so on to infinity (which, by the way, is theoretically not so infinite, resting with no less than the Supreme Commander-in-Chief himself). I refer to the notorious Ulman affair…

As already known, military servicemen from army part 87341, (GRU special troops): namely captain Eduard Ulman, lieutenant Alexander Kalagansky, ensign Vladimir Voevodin and major Alexey Perelevsky were accused of killing six civilians in January 2002. The people had been returning from the settlement of Shatoi to the village of Dai. The trial took place in the North Caucasian military court, and much has been written already about it. Here a brief outline of the affair.

The investigation discovered that on 12 January 2002, a group under the command of Ulman was ordered to capture the rebel field commander Khattab. The GRU had in its hands information that Khattab and his followers could be in the village of Dai. An automobile matching the description of the one believed to be used by Khattab was spotted by a military road block. When the driver did not stop, Ulman gave the order to shoot. When the car came to a halt it was discovered that the director of the local school, Said Alashanov, had been killed.

The other five passengers were detained, while two injured even received first aid. After that Ulman communicated with the senior major of the operative group, Perelevsky, who gave Ulman the order of command to shoot all passengers in the car. The people were taken to a local building and told: “Go, you are free!” Then the soldiers opened fire, shooting them in their backs. All victims were civilians: a principal, a director of studies, a forester, the driver, an invalid pregnant woman, Zajnap Dzhavotkhanova (a mother of seven children who was returning home after a consultation with a gynaecologist), and a young man accompanying her. The corpses were put in the car, under which explosives were attached. The next morning, the servicemen who came back to the scene of the crime found that it had not worked, and they then poured petrol over the car and set it alight.

All this was admitted by the defendants during the trial. But they declared they were operating under orders from Perelevsky, and therefore did not carry responsibility for anything. Perelevsky, in turn, also referred to instructions from above, and also declared that he was not guilty. As during the Nuremberg trials the Nazi criminals tried to justify their deeds by passing the blame onto the dead Hitler. But the tribunal back then decided that carrying out orders to commit a crime does not relieve the one who carries it out from responsibility. And the murderers were hanged. But what does any Nuremberg principles have to do with Russia – Chechnya is of course an internal matter for Russia!! What we want, we do!

On April 29, 2004 the “multinational Russian people” represented by 12 jurymen gave the murderers their verdict. In opinion of the jurymen, the killers of the civilians, “had not gone beyond the limits of their powers”. Claims of the victims to the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Finance for compensation of material damage, charges for burial and moral injury were left unanswered by the court in view of the not guilty verdict. Eduard Ulman was released from custody in the courtroom under the applause of the assembled blackshirts (the others did not need to be released: they were already out on bail as they were classified as “not presenting a danger to the public”). It became known that Ulman will continue service in the Russian Armed Forces.

And what of the Supreme Commander, father-president, guarantor of the constitution with vertical structure? Again, not a word: neither after the killing of citizens of the Russian Federation, nor after the verdict of not guilty. And about Chechnya in general, only then words about stabilisation, destroying the rebels, or international terrorism. Oh, and now some words for Kadirov...

The women, children and old people killed in Chechnya are for Putin and his circle trifling matters not worthy of attention. Most likely the matters were not even reported to them, as presumably the destruction of the half-million city of Grozny wasn’t: this Putin only recently seeing for the first time from a helicopter, and expressing with surprise its being “awful”. For Vladimir Vladimirovich there is only one Chechen worthy of his condolences: the late Akhmad-Hadzhi Kadirov. All the others, especially the small, weak and helpless, are just wood chippings in the great antiterrorist tree-felling. Best of all not to know anything about wood chippings: not for the “dear people”, nor for its “favourite leader”.