- (AFP) - Russian military inquiry into the crash of a
transport helicopter that killed 116 people, Moscow's heaviest loss in
the Chechen war, has concluded that the craft was shot down by Chechen
rebels.
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- The inquiry findings, leaked to Russia's main news agencies
Monday, were an embarrassing blow to President Vladimir Putin who has repeatedly
pronounced the war in Chechnya as over and won.
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- Instead, Putin faced the latest evidence that the rebels
are not only still well-organized, but also camped out within shooting
distance of their main headquarters in Chechnya.
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- The Mi-26 helicopter was shot down a week ago by a mobile
rocket launcher, the report conducted by Russia's main military headquarters
in the North Caucasus said.
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- It added that a further inquiry has been launched because
officials now suspect that the Strela missile was probably stolen from
one of Russia's warehouses outside the Chechen capital Grozny.
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- Reports of Chechens actually purchasing Russian weaponry
from federal troops have been rampant throughout the 35-month war.
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- Overloaded beyond capacity with troops and some civilians,
the chopper crashed into a minefield just a few hundred yards (meters)
in front of Russia's military headquarters of Khankala, a northeastern
suburb of the rebel capital Grozny.
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- Breaking a three-day silence, President Vladimir Putin
on Thursday lashed out at the military, accusing it of failing to follow
through on reforms that may have prevented a chopper crash.
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- But Putin, who launched the Chechnya offensive while
still serving as prime minister in October 1999, said nothing at the time
of the possibility that the rebels could have shot down the aircraft --
the biggest helicopter in the world, known as The Cow.
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- "Even a preliminary analysis shows that most of
incidents like this are caused by military commanders' failure to follow
their direct responsibilities -- starting from senior commander through
to their subordinates," Putin angrily told Defense Minister Sergei
Ivanov on Thursday.
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- "Military reforms are being conducted so that the
army becomes more viable and effective, so that such tragedies do not happen,"
Putin told Ivanov, who rushed to the scene of the crash Tuesday and suspended
a top army general in charge of the ground troops' air force.
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- "We must draw very serious conclusion ... regardless
of commanders' ranks and any negative consequences that may follow,"
he said.
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- Analysts say the downing has piled pressure on Putin
to reorganize the military's command in order to deflect some of the criticism
away from the Kremlin.
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- Newspapers have compared the incident to the August 2000
sinking of the Kursk nuclear submarine that claimed the lives of 118 seamen.
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- But with power struggles continuing to rage between competing
Russian government clans in Moscow, Putin is seen as likely to cling on
to a few allies from his native Saint Petersburg.
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- These include both Ivanov and Nikolai Patrushev -- the
Federal Security Service (FSB, ex-KGB) director who is personally overseeing
the Chechen campaign -- who hail from Saint Petersburg and are thus unlikely
to bear the brunt of Putin's wrath.
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- There was no immediate comment from the Kremlin on Monday's
report.
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