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by Christian and Terry Park/Base21 Media Activists
dvs-b@t-online.de
parkterry@hotmail.com

Seoul, Korea--The nascent anti-war movement in South Korea has now widened its scope to include Russia and their devastating war in Chechyna, a mostly Muslim and oil-rich southern republic that has been fighting a protracted, bloody war for independence.

Around 20 peace activists from the radical youth organization All Together, as well as Buddhist monks and labor union members, fresh from two weekend mass rallies targeting U.S. war threats against Iraq, converged in front of the Russian embassy in downtown Seoul on Thursday morning. They demanded the right to self-determination of the Chechen people and the immediate end of Russian aggression against Chechnya.

The harsh realities of their hidden destruction, long censored by Moscow authorities, was recently brought into the heart of Russia and into the global spotlight when a group of armed Chechnyan independence fighters stormed a popular theater in the Russian capital, with only one demand: that President Vladimir Putin immediately pull-out Russia forces from Chechnya. They eventually toned-down their demand to a single pull-out of one Russian battalion as a "good-will gesture." But instead of ending the tragic war that has cost thousands of Chechnyan and Russian lives, President Putin waited for the rebel-imposed deadline to pass and used that excuse to send in Russian soliders to incapacitate the entire theater with poisonous gas in order to avoid executions of hostage members. AP reported that 128 hostages and 41 Chechnyan independence fighters died in the irresponsible seige. Many of the Chechnyans, especially the widowed-women fighters who were strapped with bombs, were shot in the temple at point-blanke range after they had been knocked out by the sleeping gas, according to a recent Time magazine article. According to the same article, most of the hostage casualties died as a result of the gas, which over five-times the necessary amount was used.

Peace activists attempted to give a petition to the Russian ambassador but they were refused by embassy staff. A fax sent the day before was also allegedly not received by the embassy.

An embassy official named Vladimir said that all information about the "non- existent war against Chechnya" is wrong and only official statements from the Russian government and military are the truth. "Only this is the truth! You have to know that!" he shouted to the peace group.

The protesters promised to continue the struggle against all kinds of war policies and state terror, whether it's the United States or their new ally in the fraudelent "war on terrorism."