Human rights delegation returns to Chechnya

NAZRAN, Russia - Three observers from Europe's leading human rights watchdog returned to Chechnya on Saturday after local authorities said they had resolved a dispute over who would guard them.

The three Council of Europe observers had left the Chechen town of Znamenskoye on Friday for a town just outside the rebel republic, saying they wanted Justice Ministry guards rather than military or police escorts, a Russian spokesman said.

''That was their only demand,'' spokesman Lyoma Khasuyev said.

The observers are the first international group allowed to have a presence in Chechnya since the war in the breakaway republic began nine months ago. They arrived Friday in Znamenskoye, where they were to work in the offices of Russian President Vladimir Putin's human rights envoy.

Peter Iiskola, a Finnish member of the observer team, denied they had left for security reasons.

''We have not been threatened, our safety has been guaranteed,'' he said on Finnish YLG radio. He said he had left to accompany a friend to an airport on the Russian side because they didn't want to use a military airport inside Chechnya.

In Moscow on Saturday, Council of Europe Secretary-General Walter Schwimmer and Italian Foreign Minister Lamberto Dini met with Putin and Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov. Putin said Russia would listen to European criticism of the war but would not compromise national interests.

''We will always insist on our national interests, but we attach importance to the Council of Europe's view on human rights,'' Putin was quoted as saying by Interfax news agency.

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe has suspended Russia's voting rights and called for expelling Russia from the organization because of accusations of human rights violations by Russian troops in Chechnya.

Russia has dismissed the accusations as interference in its internal affairs, and for months refused to allow any international presence in Chechnya. But in April, facing possible suspension from the council, Russia agreed to allow a full-time mission at Znamenskoye.

Russian troops are not engaged in large-scale battles in Chechnya anymore, but they continue to bomb and shell rebel positions in Chechnya's southern mountains. Rebels have fought back with ambushes, remote-control mines and car bombs.

The war in Chechnya is the second in a six-year period. Independence fighters expelled Russian troops from Chechnya in a 1994-96 war, but the troops returned in September after Chechnya-based Islamic militants seized villages in the neighboring Russian region of Dagestan. The government also blamed Chechens for a series of apartment bombings last year that killed about 300 people.