Movsar Barayev, right, flanked by members of his group, speaking with NTV television inside the theater early Friday morning
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Posted on 10/28/2002 5:00:47 AM PST by nicmarlo
In his last interview, some 24 hours before he was killed, Movsar Barayev sat slumped in a chair, peering at the camera with weary and dazed eyes.
"Our group is called Islam's suicide brigade," said Barayev, who led the hostage operation. "Our goal -- and we have repeatedly declared it -- is to stop the war and remove [Russian] troops [from Chechnya]."
Barayev, a nephew of slain guerrilla leader Arbi Barayev, said the hostage-taking was ordered by Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev.
"We act on the order of our superior military emir ... Shamil Basayev," a stumbling Barayev told NTV at about 4 a.m. Friday, more than 30 hours after seizing the theater. "You all know him well."
The aim of the siege was to force Moscow to start peace talks with Chechen rebel leader Aslan Maskhadov, he said. "Maskhadov is our president. ... We submit to him ... and regard him well," he said. "Resuming negotiations with Maskhadov is, perhaps, our reason to come here."
Maskhadov condemned the hostage-taking in a statement published Saturday on the official rebel web site, Chechenpress.com, and denied having anything to do with the attack.
However, Sunday Times reporter Mark Franchetti, who interviewed Barayev late Thursday, said Barayev told him the attack had been a joint operation with Basayev and Maskhadov.
Barayev was the only hostage-taker seen in the NTV interview without a mask. He was clad in fatigues, as was the man sitting next to him, who wore a black balaclava. To their right were several pistol-brandishing women dressed in black from head to toe and carrying what appeared to be explosives around their waists.
"We prepared ourselves," said the unidentified man to Barayev's right. "For two months we were coming [to the theater], watching the shows, looking at what and how."
He said the group had planned other attacks in Moscow but had failed.
"Our dream is to become shakhidy -- martyrs of Allah," Barayev told Franchetti. "The ball is in Putin's court now. It's up to him if he wants to have the lives of all these people on his conscience.
"We are more than determined to die here. Allah has already fulfilled our dreams just by allowing us to come to Moscow and mount this operation successfully. The war in Chechnya must stop. If Putin doesn't act, we will go all the way."
In a transcript of the NTV interview posted on Chechen.org/kavkaz but not aired on television, Barayev said he would only release non-Russian hostages if officials from their home countries came to get them because Russians could not be trusted. "They may kill [the hostages] and blame us for the murders," he was quoted as saying.
Barayev also denied a suggestion by President Vladimir Putin that the attack was planned abroad.
Law enforcement officials who viewed the corpses of the hostage-takers said several Arabs and Afghans were among them. Fifty hostage-takers were killed, 18 of whom were women, the FSB said. Three were detained.
Among the women, according to pro-Moscow Chechen police cited by Izvestia, were the widows of rebel warlords Arbi Barayev and the Akhmadov brothers, Zelimkhan and Rezvan.
Other members of the raid included Khampash Tekirbayev, Isa Chantiyev, Khusein Tsayev, Ismail Eskiyev and a man identified only as Abuzar, the newspaper said. The first names of two of Barayev's female commandos were Raisa and Fatima.
Movsar Barayev, right, flanked by members of his group, speaking with NTV television inside the theater early Friday morning
I SEARCHED FOR THIS ARTICLE AND DID NOT SEE IT POSTED; sorry if this is duplicated.
Among the women, according to pro-Moscow Chechen police cited by Izvestia, were the widows of rebel warlords Arbi Barayev and the Akhmadov brothers, Zelimkhan and Rezvan.
That Barayev clan is one happy family. I wonder how dinner time conversations go...
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