Rally offers Putin support over hostage bloodbath

1.00pm

BESLAN, Russia - Russian state television predicted at least 100,000 people would attend a Moscow rally tomorrow to denounce terrorism, bolstering President Vladimir Putin against critics over a Chechnya-linked hostage bloodbath.

The rally, just outside the Kremlin, takes place on a second day of national morning for 335 people - half of them children - killed in last week's school hostage crisis that ended in a fierce battle between Chechen rebels and Russian troops.

Television newscasts and slick advertisements featuring cultural or sports personalities provided wide promotion for the rally as opposition politicians accused Putin of failing to ensure security for ordinary Russians.

"What has happened in recent days cannot be called anything but war," figure skating champion Igor Bobrin said in one advert for the 5pm (1am NZT) rally.

"We must feel that we are standing shoulder to shoulder."

State television showed rallies taking place in other centres on Monday, with tens of thousands in Russia's second city St Petersburg.

Grief-stricken mothers and fathers trudged through mud and rain to bury their dead children in graves dug out of a soccer-field sized patch of wasteland in the town of Beslan in the province of North Ossetia, bordering Chechnya.

While flags flew at half-mast across Russia, critics said Putin had failed to keep a pledge he made on coming to power in 2000 to end a separatist revolt in Chechnya. They also said troops bungled a storming of the school to rescue hostages.

In the past two weeks Chechen rebels, who have waged a 10-year uprising in Chechnya for independence, have also been blamed for bringing down two airliners, killing 90 people, and a Moscow metro suicide bombing in which nine people were killed.

In predominantly Orthodox North Ossetia, troops tightened security on borders with mainly Muslim Chechnya and other regions in the Caucasus -- a volatile patchwork of religious and ethnic groups with old hatreds.

The hostage crisis, during which rebels held more than 1000 children, parents and teachers attending festivities marking the first day of the school term, has had ramifications beyond Russia's borders.

Nato Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer called a meeting of Nato states and Russia for Tuesday to discuss the issue, but an alliance spokesman gave no further details.

"I can certainly assume there will be a strong expression of grief and sorrow," said one Nato official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

However, Chechnya has always been a thorny issue in co-operation between Russia and many Western countries, who have questioned Moscow's human rights record in fighting separatism in the troubled region.

The European Union expressed solidarity on Monday, seeking to defuse a row after Moscow reacted angrily to a request by the Dutch EU presidency for an explanation for the carnage.

French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin told a radio debate, however, France wanted to express solidarity "but also we want to have all the necessary information and we remind Russia every time we meet of the need to respect human rights".

Putin, a former KGB spy, refuses to negotiate with anyone in the Chechen separatist camp, including fugitive President Aslan Maskhadov, who denies involvement in the school siege.

The Kremlin leader backs Chechnya's new President Alu Alkhanov who was elected last month in a poll denounced by rights groups as rigged.

Like some Western leaders, critics in Russia questioned Putin's stance that Russia was the victim of international terrorism rather than home grown Chechen militants.

"The official claim that international terrorism is behind the Beslan tragedy is a trick designed to divert responsibility away from the Kremlin," said liberal politician Boris Nemtsov.

- REUTERS