#7
Russia's hostage behaviour dismays EU - diplomats
By Gareth Jones

BRUSSELS, Oct 30 (Reuters) - The European Union had been dismayed by Russia's "heavy-handed" behaviour since the end of its hostage crisis but believed the two sides could avoid any serious damage to ties, EU diplomats said on Wednesday.

Russia, still reeling from the crisis last week involving Chechen gunmen, unsuccessfully pressured EU president Denmark to ban a two-day Chechen gathering in Copenhagen.

The Danes then moved the venue of the next EU-Russia summit, set for November 11, to Brussels from Copenhagen to defuse the growing diplomatic tensions. On Wednesday, they also arrested a senior Chechen participant in the conference at Moscow's behest.

"The Russians have been rather heavy-handed. They do not serve themselves well with such tactics. Any other EU member state would have acted in the same way as Denmark has," said one EU diplomat.

"But clearly we had to act to prevent the worsening Russia-Denmark relations from spilling over into the wider EU relationship," the diplomat added. Denmark holds the EU's six-month rotating presidency until December 31.

Russia's President Vladimir Putin is now expected to travel to Brussels for the summit, which will focus on economic cooperation and Russia's enclave of Kaliningrad.

Diplomats said Russia's attempts to scupper the congress of Chechen exiles, planned long before the hostage drama at the Moscow theatre, had served merely to advertise the event.

"Their tactics appear like a well-orchestrated, advertising campaign for the Chechens," said a second EU diplomat.

The hostage crisis, which ended on Saturday when Russian special forces stormed the Moscow theatre where about 50 Muslim Chechen rebels threatened to kill more than 750 hostages, had put the Chechen conflict firmly back on the international agenda, the diplomats said.

CALL FOR POLITICAL SOLUTION IN CHECHNYA

German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and French Foreign Minister Dominique De Villepin have all called on Russia in recent days to seek a political solution in Chechnya.

Russia, which sees its fight against the Chechen separatists as part of the international war on terrorism declared by Washington after September 11, 2001, has begun rounding up ethnic Chechens in Moscow suspected of links with the hostage crisis.

"Clearly, this episode puts the Chechen issue -- which had been put on the back burner after September 11 -- back at the forefront of our relations," the first EU diplomat said.

Although Russia has welcomed Denmark's decision to detain the Chechen official, Akhmed Zakayev, for 13 days, the diplomats said it was not clear whether Copenhagen would extradite him to Moscow.

Moscow has provided the Danes with evidence that it says links Zakayev to the theatre siege crisis and to other "terrorist" acts from 1996-9.

Denmark said it needed more evidence to extradite Zakayev, but said it might do so if Moscow vowed not to use the death penalty, still on its statute book but unused since a 1996 moratorium.

EU diplomats said they had also been shocked by Russia's refusal to say what gas was used to knock out the hostage takers when they stormed the theatre.

The gas, finally named by Russia on Wednesday as the opiate Fentanyl, has been responsible for the death of all but two of the 119 hostages who died in the siege. Most died of respiratory and heart failure.

"Through its secrecy, its lack of transparency and its treatment of the hostages' families, Russia clearly has a very different understanding of the state from us," said a diplomat.

"But nothing should be allowed to detract from our determination to build a strategic relationship with Russia," the diplomat added.