Arbi Barayev

Arbi Alautdinovich Barayev ( _ce. Арби Алаутдинович Бараев) ( _ru. Бараев, Арби Алаутдинович) (1973 - June 23, 2001), nicknamed "Terminator", was a Chechen warlord and renegade leader of Special Purpose Islamic Regiment (SPIR), a militant Chechen rebel group, often accused of a clandestine links with the Russian special services. Arbi Barayev was the uncle of Movsar Barayev, a key figure in the 2002 Moscow theater hostage crisis.

Biography

Arbi Barayev and his men fought in the First Civil War of 1994-1996 for the Chechen separatist side. It was then when they committed their first kidnapping, abducting for ransom a group of 30 Russian engineers in the Chechen capital Grozny.

After the end of the war, Barayev, who was reported boasting that he personally killed 170 people, and his associates became infamous for their alleged part in a wave of lawlessness which swept the devastated republic, including brutal killings and kidnappings as well as possibly two attempts to assassinate the Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov. Barayev and his group, based around the town of Urus-Martan, were linked to a series of high-profile crimes including the September 1996 shooting dead six foreign International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) employees in the ICRC hospital of Novye Atagi.

A commonly accusation against Barayev regarded the late 1998 abduction and beheading of four foreign mobile phone engineers. [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/234180.stm Chechen president orders kidnap crackdown] , BBC News, December 13, 1998] It was claimed that the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB) outbid the employers of kidnapped Briton engineers to get them decapitated by Barayev and his gang rather than be released; supposedly, the video and photographic materials of their executions fed the FSB propaganda efforts at beginning of Second Chechen War. [http://www.psan.org/document551.html The Security Organs of the Russian Federation. A Brief History 1991-2004] by Jonathan Littell, Psan Publishing House 2006.] A former Russian hostage Abdurakhman Adukhov told the BBC that Barayev told him it was Osama bin Laden who paid him $30m for the atrocity, outbidding the ransom offer of $10m. [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/1663278.stm Britons killed 'by Bin Laden ally'] , BBC News, 18 November, 2001] Barayev himself denied that his group kidnapped and killed the foreigners. [http://projects.ldc.upenn.edu/TDT3/topic.research/topic3056.html Chechnya Rebel Kidnapping and Beheading] ]

In 1997, Maskhadov signed a decree putting Barayev's Special Purpose Islamic Regiment (SPIR) armed group under the command of the Chechen interior ministry. However, Barayev refused to obey the order. His militia and some Islamist allies fought with the Chechen government forces outside the town of Gudermes in the summer of 1998. Around 80 people were killed in the fighting. The Islamic Regiment was not disarmed, [ [http://iwpr.net/?p=crs&s=f&o=159398&apc_state=henicrs2002 Moscow Tragedy: More Questions Than Answers] ] but Barayev was stripped of his rank of Brigade General and declared as the "enemy of Ichkeria and the Chechen people". In December 1998, Barayev's militia dug trenches around Urus-Martan and threatened to attack the Russian targets outside of Chechnya if Maskhadov tried to fight them.

In the early phase of the Second Chechen War in March 2000, Barayev reportedly betrayed the Chechen field commander Ruslan Gelayev to the Russian military forces, resulting in the massacre of Gelayev's forces in the battle of Komsomolskoye. According to another version, Barayev and his men merely bribed their way out of Komsomolskoye while leaving Gelayev and his people to their fate. [ [http://www.jamestown.org/publications_details.php?volume_id=23&issue_id=1838&article_id=17482 The Jamestown Foundation ] ] The incident led to the vendetta declaration on the part of Gelayev later in 2000, whose fighters then blew up several houses belonging to Barayev in his home village of Alkhan-Kala near Grozny, killed a number of his men, and even attempted to assassinate Barayev in Ingushetia. According to federal authorities, 44 Chechen fighters died as a result of these clashes. [http://users.jyu.fi/~aphamala/pe/issue2/sanobar.htm "Russian anti-terrorist operation"] , "Moskovskiye Novosti", August 8, 2000]

Barayev freely lived in Alkhan-Kala and passed through Russian military checkpoints without any problems. He also was not included in the lists of people wanted "for participation in illegal armed groups" (lists which included Aslan Maskhadov). When arresteded, he was said to be instantly released by the demand of Bislan Gantamirov, then the leading figure in the pro-Moscow government. In May 2000, the Russian military intelligence GRU officer leaked papers about Barayev's affiliation with FSB to a Chechen journalist.

In April 2001, Barayev's men ambushed and killed Viktor Popkov, a Russian dissident working in Chechnya as an aid worker and human rights activist since 1995. [ [http://www.memo.ru/eng/memhrc/texts/app0302.shtml Appeal to the UN Commission for Human Rights] , Memorial, 27.03.2002] According to the U.S. Department of State, Barayev sent a group of his fighters to train in Taliban-controlled areas of Afghanistan in the spring of this year. [ [http://www.peaceinthecaucasus.org/reports/paper_statedepartment.htm Chechen Terrorist Organizations: Statement of the Case - U.S. Department of State] ]

Chechen surgeon Khassan Baiev described Barayev as

"a born killer, and his men were desperados with blood vendettas proclaimed against them for murder. They joined Barayev for protection against the avengers in an endless cycle of violence... He owned a stable of expensive foreign cars, had several wives, and moved around with an escort of twenty to thirty guards. Everyone assumed that he was in the pay of Russian intelligence. Relatives of Arbi Barayev publicly denounced him for his crimes, saying that the family announced in the courtyard of the mosque that if anyone killed him, they would relinquish all claims. There would be no blood revenge." Khassan Baiev, Ruth Daniloff. "The Oath: A Surgeon Under Fire." Walker & Company. 2004. ISBN 0-802-71404-8. (Khassan Baiev is a surgeon who amputated leg of Shamil Basayev after his injury on a mine field and operated on Salman Raduev and Arbi Barayev himself. However, Barayev promised to kill Baiev because he always also helped wounded Russian soldiers if necessary).]

Death

On June 23, 2001, Barayev was reported killed during a raid by Russian special forces on Alkhan-Kala; Russian military spokesman said that 17 other Chechens and at least one soldier were killed in the operation. Previously, Barayev had been reported killed by the Russian media several times but every time he re-emerged unscathed, but this time the Kavkaz Center announced that "special Islamic commander Arbi Barayev has become a martyr." His body was given to his family for a funeral. [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/1406317.stm Russians kill Chechen warlord] , BBC News, 25 June, 2001] (In contrast, when Aslan Maskhadov was killed in 2005, he was buried by the Russians in an unmarked secret grave. [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4348273.stm Maskhadov body furore escalates] , BBC News, 14 March, 2005] )

According to the another version of Barayev's death, the GRU decided to get rid of him after the suspicious death of FSB chief Vice-Admiral German Ugryumov, who allegedly provided cover ("krysha") for Barayev. In a well-prepared five-day operation, GRU agents recruited from the Chechen in blood feud with Arbayev searched for him in Alkhan-Kala and then stormed a local FSB base where he ran for cover, killing an FSB agent in the process. Barayev was allegedly captured alive and then tortured to death. [http://users.jyu.fi/~aphamala/pe/2003/tsets-6.htm The Background of Chechen Independence Movement VI: From the Dubrovka Theatre to "Black Widows"] ]

In October 2002, the widow of Barayev, Zura Barayeva, was killed while taking part in the Moscow hostage crisis. The attack was led by the Arbi's 22-year old nephew and successor Movsar, who also died during the incident. The remnants of Barayev's SPIR group were reportedly integrated into the mainstream rebel forces following the theatre seizure. In October 2007, the next Chechen separatist President Doku Umarov made a controversial move when he posthumously restored Barayev to the rank of Brigadier General. [ [http://jamestown.org/chechnya_weekly/article.php?articleid=2373712 Chechnya Weekly; Convoy Ambushed in Vedeno] ]

References

External links

* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2355219.stm Rebel leader's notorious family] BBC News, 23 October, 2002