Diplomats Go to Chechnya Seeking Peace : Europe: International team will try to arrange talks between Russia and embattled republic.

In the first such effort by an outsider, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe is sending a mission to Chechnya today to try to arrange peace talks between Moscow and the tiny republic’s secessionist leaders.

The six-member diplomatic team announced here Monday that the OSCE, whose 53 members include the United States, Canada, European nations and former Soviet republics, had won Russia’s consent for its peace effort during negotiations in Vienna earlier this month.

The team’s departure for Chechnya comes amid open strains within the Russian government over how to stop the war before President Clinton and other world leaders arrive here for May 9 ceremonies marking the 50th anniversary of Nazi Germany’s defeat.

Clinton has criticized Moscow’s actions in the 4-month-old Chechen war, which has claimed at least 20,000 lives. Russian forces now control Grozny, the capital, and nearly all the lowlands of the mostly Muslim republic but are under sporadic attack by rebels based in the Caucasus Mountains.

Russian Prime Minister Viktor S. Chernomyrdin has assured U.S. officials that he is working on a peace settlement to avoid any embarrassing bloodshed during Clinton’s visit. He announced Friday that Moscow is ready to negotiate with Chechen field commanders without preconditions.

But Defense Minister Pavel S. Grachev, whose army appears to be hurrying to end the war by crushing all resistance, issued a contradictory statement Monday. He said that any talks with the rebels must be conditioned “on the hand-over of weapons and complete capitulation.”

Two other Russian leaders--Sergei A. Filatov, chief of staff for President Boris N. Yeltsin, and Vladimir F. Shumeiko, chairman of Parliament’s upper house--said Monday they doubt that rebels loyal to Chechen President Dzhokar M. Dudayev are interested in peace talks.

“Nobody among Dudayev’s militants will agree to negotiations, because they can do nothing but fire from a submachine gun,” Shumeiko told Russia’s Itar-Tass news agency in Ankara, Turkey.

Against this backdrop, Russian officials have downplayed the OSCE’s role in Chechnya, saying that the diplomatic team is coming to distribute humanitarian aid, monitor human rights violations, repatriate refugees and help Russian authorities organize elections.

But Sandor Mezsaroz, a Hungarian diplomat who heads the OSCE team, said he has been authorized to play a peacemaking role, is in contact with “people around Mr. Dudayev” and does not expect any obstacles to a meeting with him.

“Of course we will make contacts, will establish a dialogue with the (Chechen) side, with the forces of Mr. Dudayev and with Mr. Dudayev himself,” Mezsaroz told reporters. “This is how we will search for ways to resolve the conflict.”

The team of five Europeans and one American will set up shop in Grozny, which has been shattered by Russian bombing, in a building without phones, electricity or running water. The group is bringing a satellite dish and portable generator.

Mezsaroz said the diplomats will investigate allegations by the Red Cross and other neutral witnesses of a Russian massacre of at least 47 civilians in the village of Samashky this month and the disappearance of American disaster relief worker Frederick C. Cuny.

The establishment of an OSCE mission in Chechnya was demanded by the Clinton Administration and was said to be a condition for Clinton’s agreement to visit Moscow for the May 9 ceremonies and hold summit talks with Yeltsin.

Critics of the war are skeptical that any truce achieved before then would last.

“You know, they sweep (the streets), put up grandstands and erect monuments before holidays, and the same kind of cleanup is being carried out in Chechnya as well,” said Vladimir P. Lukin, a former Russian ambassador to Washington and now a member of Parliament. “There is another question of whether the dirt will be back one week after the guests leave.”

In any case, the OSCE’s mission will be around longer than that. Mezsaroz said his mandate is to stay six months.

Russian officials have been careful not to rebuff the OSCE because they want it to play a stronger role in European security, subordinating the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

Likewise, the OSCE has been cautious with Moscow. Its two preliminary missions to Chechnya this year were brief and avoided contact with Dudayev’s deputies.