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Russian President Refutes U.S. Criticism on Chechnya Issue
Russian President Vladimir V. Putin has firmly refuted America's criticism of Moscow's handling of the Chechnya issue, stressing that Russia's military campaign in the war-torn region is to prevent it from becoming a "launching pad for terrorist acts."
Putin said this on Monday during a meeting with a group of American correspondents in Kremlin, Moscow, just one day after he concluded his first summit with U.S. President George W. Bush in Slovenia.
During the summit meeting, Putin said, he spent some time responding to President Bush's criticism of Russian's military campaign in the republic of Chechnya.
The Russian leader told the reporters that he asked President Bush what the American leader would have done if terrorist bands " from down south" of Texas, Bush's home state, had seized "half the state" and used it as a base of terrorism, the New York Times reported.
So, Putin said, it is "not a fundamental question to us whether Chechnya becomes independence or stays within Russia," but rather that Russia's goal is to ensure that it never again serves as a " launching pad for terrorist acts."
He pointed out that the growing Islamic extremism and rise of warlords have divided the republic of Chechnya into "criminal fields."
In the meeting, Putin also called on the United States to take concrete steps to enhance cooperation with Russia in fighting Islamic extremists now on rampage in Afghanistan.
He said that terrorist camps in Afghanistan, known to both U.S. and Russian intelligence services, have trained terrorists that have caused deaths of both Russian and American citizens.
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