Chechnya's discovery

The discovery of the severed heads of three Britons and a New Zealander in a sack by a road in Chechnya is horrendous. Yet their fate is not entirely surprising in a republic which has for long been a cockpit of violence.

Tsarist genocide in the 19th century, wholesale deportation under Stalin and a brutal, incompetent attempt to crush rebellion in the 1990s have been Moscow's contributions to this dismal balance.

There are two obvious lessons to be drawn from the murders... The first is that Chechnya is an exceptionally dangerous place. Foreign companies must weigh very carefully the prospective gain of contracts there against the safety of their staff.

The second lesson is that deals with kidnappers merely make the situation worse. It is difficult not to believe that the spate of hostage-taking in the republic has been fed by the willingness of those seeking the victims' release to pay ransoms.

The West had sympathy for the Chechens in their 21-month war of independence. Having achieved that status in all but name, they have rapidly turned the republic into a place to be shunned.

-- The Daily Telegraph, London