From the Stage to Outrage

On October 28, 2002, two days after Russian special forces freed most of the hostages being held by Chechen Islamic militants in a Moscow theater, officials in Denmark arrested Chechnya's vice president and special envoy to Europe, Akhmed Zakayev, in his Copenhagen hotel room. The Russians accused Zakayev of playing a role in the planning of the hostage-taking and asked for his immediate extradition. Danish authorities took Zakayev, who was attending an international conference on the crisis in Chechnya, into custody and have been holding him ever since.

Russia is continuing to demand that Zakayev be extradited to Moscow to face terrorism charges there, but a Danish court recently ruled that, unless evidence is found by Dec. 5 backing up the Russian claims Zakayev was involved with the Chechen hostage takers, he must be released.

The Oscar-winning actress - a longtime activist in international crisis areas and one-time UNESCO cultural ambassador - accompanied Zakayev at the Copenhagen conference and has remained in Denmark since his arrest. In an interview with DW-WORLD, Redgrave expressed her concerns about Zakayev and the Russian war against the breakaway region of Chechnya.

DW-WORLD: Ms. Redgrave, when did you first become involved in Mr. Zakayev's case?

Vanessa Redgrave: I've been in Copenhagen continually since Oct. 27. Akhmed Sakaev was arrested at 2:17 in the morning in the hotel where we just finished our congress.

My concern is the genocide of the Chechen people. And the monstrous fabricated charges the Russian prosecutor’s office has brought to bear on the Danish government to get an extradition of Mr. Akhmed Zakaev. This is my big concern.

You have accused the Russian government of committing genocide, and that is a very serious charge.

It is a serious charge, and it is, but it is my conviction. Anyway, you know, I am not the only one. Yelena Bonner (the widow of Andrei Sakharov, Nobel Peace Prize winner, the most prominent Soviet dissident and father of Russian nuclear bomb), who has some experience of what genocide means. (Bonner) used this word when she was speaking over a year ago to the special commission on security in Europe in the U.S. State Department.

You have also accused the Western media of deliberately not reporting about the events in Chechnya, why do you think that is?

What I said was that there is a terrible thing about the media which has a very good side and a terrible side. The good sides - and let us put the good things first - are that there are a number of considerably serious and brave war correspondents and war photographers in many countries, including Russia. The bad side is when editors, for the sake of their circulations, assume people who read their papers are only interested in disaster and not in any moves for peace, rebuilding and reconstruction or the rehabilitation of children who suffer from war traumas. If a country is not considered "hot news," it doesn't find its way into the news at all.

Even after the terrorist attack in the Moscow theatre, 40 percent of the people are still against the war in Chechnya. I'm sure the percentage will rise again to where it was before - some 60 percent.

The war against the Chechen people is not only destroying the country and the lives of the Chechen population. It has already destroyed their cultural buildings, their homes. It has destroyed their countryside, destroyed their natural resources, destroyed their ecology and destroyed their children's future to a large extent. The numbers of casualties among children are absolutely horrendous. Children have been crippled by land mines, an increasing phenomenon. And, I suppose you know, according to the figures that have been released recently showing that the majority of casualties in any war situation are civilians. And the largest number of those are children.

What concrete solutions to the Chechnya problem do you endorse? Do you support the creation of the independent state of Chechnya?

It has been a crime of the European governments to have abandoned recognition of the legitimately elected Chechen government, elected in January 1997. Europe supervised and endorsed these elections, Russia endorsed these elections, and Russian President Boris Yeltsin endorsed these elections and endorsed that leadership.

If you read the reports of "Soldiers' Mothers of St. Petersburg" (a Russian NGO against violence in the army of Russian Federation) - your hair would be ready to drop out, you would be so horrified. Just see what Russian generals are doing to their own young people, it's horrifying. But if you read that, it will give you a measure of what they're doing to the Chechen people.

Europe needs to push for peace talks, and they should begin immediately. The Chechens made a number of very interesting and significant proposals at the World Chechen Congress in Copenhagen.

Europe is responsible for the growth of terrorism everywhere. If the men of peace get destroyed, the men who are capable of providing leadership for peace, for rebuilding and reconstruction - as Akhmed Sakaev is known to be by all except those who are his enemies or the cowards who lead various governments of Europe - if those people are destroyed, then the terrorists get their way. That is what is so frightening. Remember what happened to Hitler? Do you remember what the British government did? What was the result? It was the occupation of the whole of Europe and the construction of the concentration and death camps.