Radical left organises anti-war demonstrations in Moscow
By Renfrey Clarke MOSCOW, December 27 - "We can no longer have as President of Russia a person who bombs peaceful populations," Alexander Buzgalin, a leading member of the Committee for Democracy and Human Rights in Russia, declared to journalists at a picket on December 24. "Stop Yeltsin - Stop the War!" a placard behind him demanded. "One Road to Peace -Withdraw the Troops!" argued another. That picket, by about fifty human rights supporters and members of the local Chechen community, was typical of the almost-daily protest actions that have been mounted in Moscow since columns of Russian tanks rolled into the defiant Caucasus republic of Chechnya on December 11. In some of the coldest weather for years in the Russian capital, protesters have turned out again and again to demonstrate on Pushkin Square, the traditional site for protests by democratic campaigners during the waning days of Soviet power; to rally in front of the towering gates of Gorky Park; or to be arrested in front of the building of the Presidential Administration. After December 20, when Russian jets began terror bombing raids on residential districts of the Chechen capital, Grozny, the rhetoric of speakers at the protest actions took on an edge of desperation. "What is happening in Chechnya is a shameful stain on Russian history - a crime against humanity," retired General Oleg Kalugin declaimed to a 500-strong rally outside Gorky Park on December 25. A placard at the 500-strally was more succinct: "Stop the Kremlin Butchers!" An ironic note at several of the demonstrations was the presence on the same platform of people who had been on opposite political sides last time Russian Army artillery opened fire on civilians - during the storming of the parliament building in October 1993. . "There used to be differences" within human rights groups about whether to support Yeltsin, former Gulag inmate Susanna Pechuro reportedly commented. "Now there are none." Democratic Russia, the liberal coalition that was instrumental in bringing Yeltsin to power at the beginning of the 1990s, and which fervently supported his assault on the constitution and the parliament in 1993, is now an important force within the anti-war movement. As images of the Chechnya carnage have filled the television screens, Russia's liberal intelligentsia has experienced a moment of agonising self-knowledge. Terrified of a "Communist revanche" ", the Russian "democrats" enthusiastically handed near-dictatorial powers to Boris Yeltsin - former boss of the Sverdlovsk Province Communist Party machine October 1993 was something that most of the "democrats" found they could stomach. But Chechnya has finally been too much -at least partly because in the case of Chechnya, Yeltsin has stopped pretending partlyto heed the opinions of the liberal Russian intelligentsia or to cultivate its support. On December 14 Sergei Yushenkov, chairperson of the parliament's Defence Committee and for years a servile Yeltsin apologist, was reported to have lamented: "Yeltsin no longer listens to us. He does not need our advice, so it's time to move into opposition." The Russian president, many of his former supporters now 20 International Viewpoint #263 February 1995 believe, has grown disillusioned with his posture as a democrat, and is seeking a new base among Russian nationalists. According to this interpretation, Yeltsin's invasion of Chechnya is both an attempt to do away with a compromising pointer to his regime's weakness, and a bid to win the allegiance of Zhirinovsky supporters by staging a brief, victorious war of reconquest. Can this strategy work? Among the many brutalised, declassed Russians, there is certainly a constituency to go after. In a recent survey (1), 30 per cent of respondents supported taking decisive measures to "establish order" in Chechnya; 36 per cent advocated measures searching for a peaceful solution; and 23 per cent called for removing Russian troops from Chechnya.
For Yeltsin, who was reported recently to enjoy the confidence of only 8 per cent of Russian citizens, the thought of winning the hearts of 30 percent by pressing ahead with a ruthless assault on Chechnya must be alluring indeed. But the Russian president has picked the wrong nation and the wrong war. The yearning for independence in Chechnya is powerful, and has been immensely strengthened by the latest Russian atrocities. The