Is Journalism Worth Dying For__ Final Dispatches - Anna Politkovskaya [164]
These things coincided. The Zakayev affair infuriated Putin; he had lost the argument. Denmark’s decision outraged him. Headlines started appearing in the leading Western newspapers equating Putin with Miloŝevic. “Why should we accept Putin and roll out the red carpet for him when he is a state criminal?” Before the Zakayev affair you didn’t hear that kind of remark. Although European governments are forever trying to maintain good relations with Russia, which is understandable from a pragmatic viewpoint because they need Russia’s support in the impending war in Iraq, a chasm has suddenly opened up, between the logical behaviour of the upper echelons of European governments, and opposition politicians who have begun to criticize Putin and Russia harshly. There is also now a clear divide between the upper echelons and public opinion which, as a rule, is articulated by the press. The result is a change of attitude towards the Chechen War which may be important, although not decisive, for stopping it. That decision is one for the Russian Government to take. I would just like to quote what Zakayev once said: “Russia has the right to start a war with Chechnya, and it has the right to stop it.”
What do you mean by “important, although not decisive”?
Europe’s new position will seriously irritate the Russian Government, and push it towards a solution which will only result in its being constantly reminded of this irritant. Putin is very sensitive to personal attacks, and the terminology the West is adopting undermines him psychologically. He does not understand the real nature of the objections, and takes them personally. How the West reacts to Putin as an individual and his personal standing with the Russian public is one of the main sources of his power. After Brussels and Zakayev, the West is never going to view him as a friend because it sees that he does not share ideas which are fundamental to Western society. He does not believe in them, and in the West he is now considered a hypocrite.
The Zakayev incident was a fiasco. Zakayev is one of the most admirable figures in Chechnya. I have no hesitation in saying that. I know him not only from hearsay. I conducted extremely difficult negotiations in Chechnya, and never had any doubt that Zakayev wanted peace or that he was constructive in that respect. Zakayev’s role is plain for everyone in the West to see. There is not a single fact suggesting that he wishes to prolong the war, while there are many which testify to his having consistently defended the idea of a peaceful way out of this slaughter.
I consider that 2002 has been the most damaging year for Russia since 1991, when the Soviet Union collapsed. There aren’t enough fingers on one hand to list the defeats. The most important landmark is a qualitative change in the situation in Chechnya. If before 2002 I was sure that we could find a solution ourselves, negotiate peace between the belligerent sides, I consider that is now impossible. 2002 has been a watershed: the hatred on both sides has reached such heights that without international mediation – including involvement of countries outside the former Soviet bloc and the use of force – we can no longer resolve the conflict. This is Russia’s greatest setback. The country has lost its sovereignty in the sense that, without the intervention of external forces, it is incapable of settling its internal conflict. Russia has now suffered a devastating defeat in the Second Chechen War, considerably more serious than in the First, and the defeat is precisely that we have lost our sovereignty.
Russia’s second political defeat has been Kaliningrad [the Russian enclave between Poland and Lithuania]. We shouldn’t have gone on so foolishly and at such length, trying to tie everything down in terms of