Lies about Its Own Actions

In the autumn of 1994, Russia attacked the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria under the name of a puppet opposition, and on 11 December 1994 the Russian army openly invaded the republic. Throughout the war, Russian President Yeltsin, Russian ministers and generals denied the crimes of the occupation troops, attributed them to the army of Ichkeria, and passed off peaceful Chechens killed by the Russian military as its fighters.

On 1 December 1994, ten days before the open invasion, Chernomyrdin, chairman of the Russian government, by Directive No. 1886-r created the Temporary Information Center (see: "Censorship")^[1]. Human rights defenders of Memorial write that the center almost immediately began to spread disinformation and to obstruct the work of Russian and foreign journalists in Ichkeria^[2].

To inquiries from UN rapporteurs and deputies of the Russian parliament, the Russian government, the command of the occupation troops and the military prosecutor's office replied that the soldiers had been attacked by the army of Ichkeria and that no reports of crimes had been received^[3][2].

Russian ministers, generals and press services denied that the army had fought in Ichkeria in the autumn of 1994^{[4][5][6][7][2]}, and that pilots had bombed Grozny in December 1994^[2][8][9]. On 4 February 1995, Russian Justice Minister Kovalyov said that he and his colleagues had visited Ichkeria and had not found a single case of looting by Russian soldiers^[2].

The operational headquarters of the Russian government and the Russian military attributed to the army of Ichkeria the destruction of residential districts of Grozny in December 1994^[10][2] and the killings of peaceful people in the towns of Shali in January 1995^[11][2] and Gudermes in April 1995^[2].

Russian President Yeltsin promised to stop the bombing or declared the fighting over on 27 December 1994^[2], 19 January 1995^[12][13], 10 May 1995^[14] and 5 April 1996^[15], and Chernomyrdin, chairman of the government, on 17 July 1996^[2]. After each statement, Russian troops went on bombing and storming the villages and towns of Ichkeria^[2][15].

On 7 April 1995, the Internal Troops of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs (predecessors of today's Rosgvardia) stormed Samashki, a village in the west of Ichkeria. On 7 and 8 April, the occupiers killed 103 peaceful Chechens in the village (see: "Mass Killings of Civilians")^[16]. On the evening of 7 April, the first channel of Russian television and the NTV television channel, citing the Interfax news agency and the Russian military, reported that fighters of the army of Ichkeria had shot the village elders. That day, Russian soldiers had fired on the cars in which the elders and the mullah were returning from negotiations. All eight people in the cars survived. On 11 April, five elders of Samashki handed human rights defenders of Memorial a statement: "The statement of the military leadership of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs is a fabrication from beginning to end"^[17]. On 29 May, the Russian parliament's commission investigating the causes of the war in Ichkeria found the reports of the shooting of the elders to be a lie^[16].

On 8 April 1995, the ITAR-TASS news agency reported that Russian troops had killed more than 130 fighters of the army of Ichkeria in battle in Samashki. On 11 April, a representative of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs told an NTV correspondent of 120 fighters killed by the Russian military and said that the peaceful Chechens had left before the storming. That day, Soskovets, deputy chairman of the Russian government, answered an NTV correspondent's question about the killings of women and men in the village: "No, there is nothing of the kind"^[16]. Russian investigators in the filtration camp in Mozdok, a town in Russian-controlled North Ossetia, offered Makhmudemin Iziev from Samashki to sign testimony that the Chechen fighters had fired first. On 18 April, the Russian military released him without charges^[2][16]. Govorukhin, chairman of the Russian parliament's commission investigating the causes of the war, told the deputies after his trip to Samashki on 14 April that he had counted there "about fifty destroyed or damaged houses"^[16]. On 1 May 1995, the human rights defender Sergei Kovalyov said at a hearing in the US Congress that his group of human rights defenders had compiled a list of 374 destroyed houses in the village^[18]. In July, some members of the Russian parliament's commission wrote a conclusion in the name of the whole commission: "men must be excluded from the list [of Chechens killed in the village]. People who held an assault rifle or a grenade launcher in their hands cannot be considered peaceful residents". The report of the Observer Mission of Russian human rights defenders says that in this way the deputies recorded all the men of Samashki as fighters of the army of Ichkeria. The Mission named all 103 Chechens killed by the occupiers - 90 men and 13 women. Four of them had held weapons in their hands^[16]. On 15 August 1995, the Russian government replied to the UN Special Rapporteur on torture that the houses in Samashki had been destroyed by fighters of the army of Ichkeria, and that the military prosecutor's office had received no reports of executions of Chechens without trial^[19].

Shkirko, the commander of the occupation troops, denied the bombing of the village of Roshni-Chu in October 1995^[20]. Russian generals denied the shelling of the settlement of Novogroznensky in February 1996^[2]. Tikhomirov, the commander of the occupation troops, stated in March 1996 that the military prosecutor's office had received no reports of looting^[2], and in April 1996 denied that his subordinates had killed Dzhokhar Dudayev, the president of Ichkeria^[2].

Shkirko, the commander of the occupation troops, gave a figure of 267 casualties among the townspeople of Gudermes, which Russian troops stormed in December 1995. Human rights defenders of Memorial write that this figure is greatly understated^[2]. Russian Defense Minister Grachev recorded as fighters of the army of Ichkeria the peaceful Chechens whom his troops killed in the settlement of Novogroznensky in February 1996^[2]. A representative of the Russian military attributed to Chechen fighters dressed in Russian uniforms the looting that Russian soldiers carried out in the village of Sernovodsk in March 1996 (see: "Pillage")^[2].

On 28 March 1996, a Russian pilot dropped a bomb on Katyr-Yurt, a village south-west of Grozny, and killed nine people of the Khazhgiriyev family (see: "Indiscriminate Attacks"). The next day, Tikhomirov, the commander of the occupation troops, according to the Interfax news agency, admitted that the crew had bombed without orders and apologized to the family^[2][21]. On 31 March, Russian President Yeltsin, in an address to the citizens of Russia, promised to halt the offensive. On the night of 3 April and on 4 April, Russian pilots bombed Shalazhi, a village south-west of Grozny, and killed three Chechens^[2][15]. Deinekin, the commander of the Russian Air Force, and Tikhomirov called the bombing a provocation^[2]. On 10 April, Deinekin said at a press conference shown by the Vesti program of the RTR television channel: "neither Katyr-Yurt, nor Shalazhi twice, nor any other populated areas were bombed or planned to be bombed by the federal Air Force [the Russian air force] and army aviation". The general added that the bombs in the villages were being set off by fighters of the army of Ichkeria^[2]. Kureysh Khazhgiriyev, a Chechen from Katyr-Yurt whose relatives were killed by the Russian pilot, said on 22 April to the public tribunal of the Russian Glasnost Foundation in Moscow: "I cannot bear to hear General Deinekin blasphemously declare that they did not bomb. I have no words! Shame on the general"^[15]. Russian prosecutors suspended the cases on the bombings of Katyr-Yurt and Shalazhi (see: "Impunity of Perpetrators"). In November 1997, the military prosecutor's office of Russia admitted in a letter to Memorial that Katyr-Yurt had been bombed by an aircraft of the Russian troops, and of Shalazhi wrote that Russian aviation had struck the army of Ichkeria there^[2].

Generals of the occupation troops denied the shelling of the town of Urus-Martan in May 1996^[22][2]. A representative of Russian aviation denied the bombing of the Nozhay-Yurt district in the south-east of Ichkeria on 3 June 1996, the third day of the ceasefire agreed by Russia and Ichkeria^[2][23]. In July 1996, Russian soldiers held detained Chechens in pits in Khankala, the main base of the occupation troops on the eastern outskirts of Grozny. That month, Solovyov, the military prosecutor of the Russian troops in the North Caucasus, replied to Yuly Rybakov, a deputy of the Russian parliament, that he had found no unofficial filtration camps. By 5 August, the occupiers had released the detainees^[2].

Commander Tikhomirov recorded as fighters the peaceful Chechens whom Russian pilots killed in the town of Shali in April 1996^[2]. The headquarters of the occupation troops attributed to the army of Ichkeria the shelling of the town of Urus-Martan in May 1996, in which the crews of Russian helicopters killed townspeople^[2][15]. The Russian military repeatedly stated that the army of Ichkeria was defending itself in mosques and cultural monuments. Isa Adayev, director of the National Museum of the Chechen Republic, told the public tribunal of the Glasnost Foundation in Prague in May 1996 that this was untrue^[15]. General Shamanov, who commanded the storming of the village of Makhkety, recorded as fighters of the army of Ichkeria the peaceful Chechens whom Russian troops killed there in July 1996^[2][24].

In August 1996, when the Armed Forces of Ichkeria had encircled the occupiers in Grozny, the command of the occupation troops and Russian Defense Minister Rodionov declared that they controlled the center of the city^[2][25].

Human rights defenders of Memorial write that many reports by Russian newspapers, radio and television about atrocities of the army of Ichkeria, citing official Russian sources, turned out on checking to be lies^[2].

On 21 November 1997, almost a year after the last Russian troops had left Ichkeria, Smirnov, deputy chief military prosecutor of Russia, wrote to Memorial that Roshni-Chu had been bombed by eight attack aircraft whose affiliation the prosecutor's office had not established. The prosecutor denied that in August 1996 soldiers of the 101st Brigade of the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs had taken Chechen men hostage at the "15th Gorodok", their base in Grozny. The brigade released the men when their relatives met its demands (see: "Hostage-Taking")^[2].