On faraway provinces

Time and again, the 19th century British commentator Lord Macaulay is proven right when he said words to the effect that faraway provinces are not worth the trouble of keeping them in line. Read Chechnya, read Aceh, read Tibet.

The Chechen question will continue to haunt for a long time to come, the more so if Vladimir Putin, once of the KGB, continues to believe that the only solution is military. Even as his special forces kill over 100 hostages in the Moscow theater drama with what the BBC suggested may have been the gas BZ, which is banned under the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) to which Russia is a signatory, he proposes more of the mailed fist.

The Chechen hard-liners, who have many crimes of their own to answer for, will, of course, pursue more of their own same, hijackings, car bombings and plain murder. Stalin deported the Chechen people to Siberia, but it didn't break their spirit. Putin and the generals have bombed their cities and villages to ruin, but, perverse lot that they are, they still spit defiance in the faces of the Russians. As Lord Macaulay said ...

While all this is going on, one can only wait with bated breath for some relevant questions about violations of the above CWC to be asked by Bush and Blair. On second thought, I will not hold my breath on this one. Questions of this kind would be highly embarrassing for the Toxic Texan and his London page boy to ask at this time as they prepare to assault Iraq and its "weapons of mass destruction" (WMD). "Ssshh! Putin's on our side." It would be too much to expect from men bent on war.

Meanwhile, Ariel Sharon tells us that Putin's response is a model for all "civilized nations" in dealing with terror; this from a man with the Beirut refugee camp massacres of 1982 and a string of other major violations of international humanitarian law to answer for, violations which the Toxic Texan will not want him brought to book.

Nobody in their right mind believes that armed men and women (were the feminists who believe war is a singularly male occupation taking notice of the Chechen women with guns?) should be allowed to simply walk into theaters or wherever and take hostages. It is a crime, full stop. The Russian response to it, however, far from being praiseworthy is not a civilized model at all. As an Arab journalist said on BBC TV's "Dateline London" recently "some patience was in order".

DAVID JARDINE, Jakarta