Quotation of the year:
�In this year, two truly democratic elections, Presidential and Parliamentary, were held in Kazakhstan for the first time in the 20th century.�
President Nursultan Nazarbaev
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin told media that a recent indictment of Russian policies in Chechnya by US President Bill Clinton did not mark worsening ties between the two countries. �We have very good relations with the United States. We have very good relations with the leadership of the United States,�� he announced in a Moscow press conference on Thursday, December 9.
�I would consider it absolutely incorrect to produce the impression that some kind of period of cooling off of relations between Russia and the United States has begun or is beginning.� The Prime Minister stated. He expressed a belief that Clinton�s critical remarks regarding Chechnya stemmed from a desire to �prevent Russia from any additional problems.�
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin told media that a recent indictment of Russian policies in Chechnya by US President Bill Clinton did not mark worsening ties between the two countries. �We have very good relations with the United States. We have very good relations with the leadership of the United States,�� he announced in a Moscow press conference on Thursday, December 9.
�I would consider it absolutely incorrect to produce the impression that some kind of period of cooling off of relations between Russia and the United States has begun or is beginning.� The Prime Minister stated. He expressed a belief that Clinton�s critical remarks regarding Chechnya stemmed from a desire to �prevent Russia from any additional problems.�
MOSCOW, Dec 9 (AFP)
Influential liberal governor Konstantin Titov warned Thursday that Russia�s military crackdown in Chechnya risked creating a Chechen equivalent of Ayatollah Khomeini who could come back and haunt Russia.
The respected governor of the Samara region, a possible rightist candidate in presidential elections next June, urged Moscow to hold talks with a broad range of Chechen leaders, including the current President Aslan Maskhadov.
�I still believe that Maskhadov retains a certain authority, and we should not overlook this but use his authority to conduct peace negotiations,� said Titov, one of the few high-profile Russian politicians to criticise the war, which has huge popular support.
Moscow�s punishing ground invasion of the separatist republic, launched October 1 ostensibly to wipe out Islamic �terrorists,� would only push the rebels into Chechnya�s southern mountains and thence to overseas bases in states like Iran, Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia, Titov said.
�Will we not then get from the Chechen people a new messiah like Iran once got (Ayatollah) Khomeini, a spiritual leader in exile,� he asked.
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