Death of a Dissident - Alex Goldfarb [46]
What immediately impressed Zakayev was that Boris and Rybkin behaved as if they had real clout.
“They were not afraid to tackle difficult issues, and they could make some decisions on the spot, for example, on prisoner exchanges and amnesty. When they could not, they would simply say, ‘We have to clear it’ or ‘We agree, but it will take some lobbying.’ They were straight with us. And we trusted them.”
Zakayev described the apparent division of labor between Berezovsky and Rybkin: “Boris did the creative stuff, proposed options, invented solutions, and Rybkin was the doubter; he sat there saying ‘This can be done, but that will never fly.’ Boris was the broker, and Rybkin a spokesman. They had a tremendous asset, ORT TV. Boris was always bringing a crew with him. Whenever we had a breakthrough or faced a problem, Rybkin would go on TV, to cut right through to Yeltsin—he watched the nightly news—and get the facts over to him before our opponents could react.”
Nevertheless, the Party of War in Moscow and the rowdy, murderous warlords in the mountains of Chechnya plotted in their separate ways to undermine the negotiations.
“I got some sense of how my counterparts got things done in the Kremlin when I arrived in Moscow at the end of November,” recalled Zakayev. The first batch of agreements was ready for signing, defining a legal framework for Chechnya’s self-administration until the elections. But the outstanding issue remained the two Russian brigades stationed in Chechnya. The Chechens were adamant to see them go, as was agreed at Khasavyurt.
On Thursday, November 21, Zakayev went to see Boris at the Security Council offices in the Kremlin administration building. He received disappointing news: the withdrawal was blocked by Interior Minister Kulikov, the supreme commander for Chechnya, who had gone on TV to say that the two brigades were to stay for another five years.
“Go talk to Kulikov yourself, so that you can see what we are up against,” Boris suggested.
The minister looked at Zakayev “as a soldier at a flea,” in the common expression of disdain in the Russian military. “These two brigades are staying there, period. They are there under special presidential decree.”
“Then there will be no signing,” exploded Zakayev. “As long as there is a single Russian soldier remaining in Chechnya, no further negotiations!”
“So be it!” said Kulikov coldly.
But on Saturday morning, Boris called Zakayev at his hotel: “You have it. The president has signed off on the pullout.” Boris also surprised Zakayev with the news that his own prime minister, Aslan Maskhadov, was in Moscow and on his way to the White House for a joint press conference with Chernomyrdin.
Zakayev turned on his TV and learned about a new presidential decree ordering the full and immediate pullout of all Russian forces.
“How did you do it?” Zakayev inquired as he shook hands with Boris at the White House ceremony.
“Well, when I told you to go see Kulikov on Thursday, I already knew that the decree would be signed later that night,” explained Boris. “But I wanted to make sure that Kulikov did not suspect as much. Right after seeing you he left for Warsaw for a meeting of East European police ministers. We used you as a decoy, you see? You were so disappointed. For Kulikov to see you with that face was the best insurance that he would take the trip. Otherwise he might have canceled, rushed to the Kremlin, made a scene, and who knows?
“Sorry for misleading you, my friend.”
Years later, Ivan Rybkin, speaking by telephone from his dacha outside Moscow, told me what really happened behind the scenes.
Late on Thursday night, in utmost secrecy, the two NSC planes carrying Boris and Rybkin left for Chechnya. Their major concern was to keep Kulikov’s people from learning what was happening for as long as possible. They did not trust telephone communications, so they decided to take the trip to personally inform