As vilification of the Taliban regime gears up, with the western leaders taking the moral high ground (and conveniently forgetting the assistance they gave to the Taliban and islamic extremism in general), another example of state repression continues unnoticed.
That is the situation in Chechnya - where a state of war between the central Russian state and separatist nationalist guerrillas has existed for years now, with ordinary people suffering most, as ever. The capital, Grozny, lies in Ruins and tens of thousands of refugees live on Chechen borders, too frightened of Russian military brutality to go home. Killings, torture and arbitrary detention are commonplace. Russia is seeking to hold on to strategically important territory (located as Chechnya is near the oil of the Caspian Sea). There is the fear that a breakaway Chechnya would fall out of the Russian orbit, maybe to come under the influence of rivals such as Iran. The continued bloodshed goes on with little attention paid to it in "the West". Quite simply, there is nothing to gain from criticising Russian actions (hypocritical as this would perhaps be, given all capitalist states' readiness to use violence to further their aims) because it is economically and politically expedient now to maintain an uneasy friendliness with Russia. And it must be remembered that "the West" paid precious little attention to the brutality of the Taliban regime when it wasn't seen to pose a threat to western interests. Now things have changed, and the "great and good" have changed their tune. The capitalists and their "democratic" politicians will support any dictator (e.g. Saddam Hussein, Suharto) so long as their interests are served. When they are not, they will turn on them. "Morality" doesn't come into it. jt www.worldsocialism.org __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Everything you'll ever need on one web page from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com
