Putin Cancels Talks with Schroeder Amid Chechen Hostage Crisis

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Thursday, October 24, 2002

Putin Cancels Talks with Schroeder Amid Chechen Hostage Crisis

Russian President Vladimir Putin has canceled his talks with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder scheduled at later Thursday in Berlin due to the Chenchen hostage crisis, the Kremlin announced.

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Russian President Vladimir Putin has canceled his talks with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder scheduled for Thursday in Berlin and also a working visit to Portugal on the same day given the hostage crisis, the Kremlin announced.

According to the original schedule, the president is also due to leave Portugal for Mexico to hold talks with US president George W. Bush on Iraq scheduled for Saturday.

Late on Wednesday night, Russian Interior Minister Boris Gryzlov and FSB Domestic Intelligence Service Chief Nikolai Patrushev Luzhkov were summoned to the Kremlin to give a briefing on the current situation to Putin, who kept vigil for all night, according to his spokesman Alexei Gromov.

The highest level of alarm has alreadby been declared in the capital and security has been tightened.

A Russian official said that by 3 a.m. (0000 GMT) Thursday morning, a group of armed Chechens had released about 170 people, mainly children, foreigners and Georgians, but were still holding most of the 700 captives in a Moscow concert hall.

Meanwhile, two leading ethnic Chechen figures have entered the concert hall, seeking negotiations with a gang of armed Chechens, who have been holding an audience of hundreds hostage.

Aslanbek Aslakhanov, a Duma member representing Chechnya, and Ruslan Khasbulatov, a former speaker of parliament, were inside the hall in southeastern Moscow, trying to set up a negotiation process, the Interfax news agency quoted Kremlin aide Sergei Yastrzhembsky as saying.

The latest Interfax report quoted Aslakhanov as saying that he held telephone talks with Chechen field commander Movsar Barayev, who controlled the hostage-taking gang, but failed to work out anyagreement. Barayev is the nephew of warlord Arbi Barayev, who was reportedly killed last year.

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