Terrorism has struck Russia with a vengeance. Ten days ago two civilian airliners exploded in mid-air, killing 90 people, and everything indicates that this was the work of Chechen terrorists. Last Tuesday bomb attacks by Chechen suicide bombers killed 10 people in Moscow, and as I write this article a hostage crisis involving over 1,000 children and parents in a school in the Russian republic of North Ossetia is coming to an end. Chechen terrorists were threatening to kill everyone in the school unless Russian troops were withdrawn from Chechnya and suspected Chechen rebels in Russian jails released.
Russia has now acknowledged that it is faced with a very serious problem. The country's Defence Minister, Sergei Ivanov, admitted: "We are in a state of war" and security has been beefed up at Russia's nuclear power plants in case these become the latest targets for the Chechens.
For the first time since Chechens resorted to terrorism in the mid-1990s, Russia called on the United Nations Security Council to condemn the hostage-taking in North Ossetia. This is significant because until now Russia has always considered the Chechen conflict to be a domestic affair and rejected any international criticism of Russia's handling of the war as interference in its internal affairs.
President Vladimir Putin has always advocated a military solution to the Chechen problem and so far public opinion has backed him. However, as the Chechens increasingly resort to terrorism, not only in their own back yard but also in Moscow, with casualties mounting by the day, opinion polls in Russia show that more and more people are fearful for their security and losing faith in Mr Putin's policies on Chechnya.
When Mr Putin was first elected President in 1999, the former KGB official ran on a platform of crushing the Chechen rebellion and restoring law and order, having started the second Chechen war as Prime Minister a few months earlier. On a conventional military basis, the Chechens were no match for the Russian army and Moscow soon reasserted its authority in the region, but this came at a high price, namely, increased resentment by the Chechens at the high-handed tactics of the Russian army and the death of many innocent civilians caught in the crossfire.
The Chechens, however, soon realised just how powerful a tool terrorism could be in highlighting their conflict and forcing public opinion to rethink its attitude towards their cause. Encouraged by the effect of suicide bombings in the Middle East the Chechens followed suit, bringing fear into the minds of Russian civilians. Last May, for example, Akhmad Kadyrov, the Chechen President, was killed by a suicide bomber while reviewing a military parade.
What is even more worrying is the link between Chechen terrorists and Al-Qaeda. Sergey Markov, the director of Moscow's Institute for Political Studies said: "A new enemy has emerged, more powerful than Chechen separatists, and that enemy is international, radical Islamic terrorism." This is the last thing that we need in the global battle against terrorism. In fact, nine of the ten hostage-takers in the school siege were Arab mercenaries, and not Chechens.
Russia's reluctance to let go of Chechnya is understandable. First of all Russia's territorial integrity is at stake. There are many other Muslim republics within the Russian Federation, and they might be encouraged to also demand independence should Chechnya be allowed to secede from Russia. Secondly, will Chechnya, in Russia's back yard, become an Islamic republic if it gains sovereignty? Surely this would not be acceptable to Moscow? Furthermore, there are rich oil reserves in Chechnya, which borders the Caspian Sea, and Russia is unlikely to give these up easily.
The Chechen question, therefore, has certainly not gone away. Mr Putin has consistently refused to negotiate with the separatists, and considering the terrible acts of terrorism that have been committed by Islamic militants, this is not surprising. One has to acknowledge, however, that certain human rights abuses in Chechnya as well as super-high unemployment and a feeling of hopelessness have contributed to the terrorists gaining sympathy among their fellow Chechens.
Has the Chechen conflict reached a point of no return? One hopes not, but military might alone has not, and will not, solve the problem. The massive Russian military campaign of the 1990s might have restored Russia's territorial integrity but the result was an upsurge of terrorism, and worse, a new "cause" for Al-Qaeda to exploit.
This conflict is a difficult nut to crack. Of course nobody wants a militant pro-Al-Qaeda Islamic republic on its doorstep which will destabilise the entire region, and yes, Al-Qaeda has exploited this conflict for its own ends, but one is surely justified is asking why this dispute has reached such terrible proportions?