Russian FSB Avoids Giving Direct Answer About Delivery of Arms to Chechnya By Belarus :: Charter'97 :: News

At a press conference on the results of common session of the heads of CIS law-enforcing agencies held in Minsk, the chairman of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) Nikolai Patrushev avoided to give direct answer for the BealPAN reporter’s question if CIS law-enforcing agencies have information about alleged delivery of arms to extremists, in particular, to Chechen armed groups, by Belarus. Belarus has been repeatedly accused of such trade by foreign mass media over the last year.

One of the latest articles on this theme was published in the beginning of January in the Washington Post. In the article “European Arsenal of Terrorism” the reporter claims, that among buyers of the Belarusian arms there were terrorists and radical groups from the Middle East, the Balkans, and Central Asia.. “Many Lukashenka’s bargains with arms had one schem, – the article reads. – The arms sent from Belarus fails to get to the country of destination stated, and is transferred to Islamic extremists, or to the country under UNO arms trade embargo, while Belarusian top officials shut their eyes to these transactions”.

“In the framework of the Council of Security Services and Secret Services’ chiefs almost we discussed the question of international terroris ( and it is the word for what is going on in Chechnya) and who is sponsoring it, almost at every sitting, - Nikolai Partushev said. – We considered the variants of financing the campaign, and how the arms get there. But we do not have real information about the ways of arms delivery, and we did not discuss these questions”.