Despite Feud, Russia and Chechnya Sign Oil Deal

Even as the separatist region of Chechnya defied Russia on Tuesday and promised to execute two criminals today, the two governments struck a deal that will link their futures economically and let Russia transport oil across the war-ravaged area.

While they remain at odds over the legality of public executions carried out under Islamic law, the pipeline agreement moved Chechnya and the Russian Federation a step closer to normalizing their relations by acknowledging that they need each other.

“It has become clear to both sides that we should be partners,” said Sultan Shabayev, deputy chief of what the Chechens call their embassy in Moscow. “And as in any partnership, the things that we have in common should be more important than the differences and disagreements that separate us.”

The two sides signed a peace accord in May that formally ended their 21-month war but did not resolve the crucial question of whether Chechnya is an independent nation, as it asserts, or a part of Russia, as Moscow maintains.

Last week, Chechnya staged the public execution of a man and woman convicted by an Islamic Sharia court on murder charges. In a gruesome scene widely televised in Russia, a four-man firing squad wielding automatic rifles sprayed the couple with gunfire as they stood side by side handcuffed to a wall.

The next day, Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin expressed outrage at the executions and at Chechnya’s willingness to empower Sharia courts to dispense their brand of justice.

“I condemn this act as a lynching,” Yeltsin said. “It is unacceptable in a civilized state. It contradicts all Russian laws and the constitution.”

While there is broad public support in Russia for capital punishment, Yeltsin decreed an end to executions this spring at least in part because of international pressure. He wants Russia to retain its membership in the Council of Europe, an international group that promotes democracy and bars member nations from carrying out executions.

Russia’s chief prosecutor said he would initiate a criminal investigation into last week’s executions. Chechen officials responded by saying that their chief prosecutor would investigate Russia’s leaders “on the fact of genocide of the Chechen people.”

On Tuesday, Chechnya escalated the war of words by announcing that it would execute two people today in another public ceremony in Grozny, the Chechen capital. The pair were convicted of murdering a husband, wife and child.

Before last week, only one person sentenced to die by a Sharia court in Chechnya had been executed. In that case, a convicted murderer was turned over to the family of his victims, who slit his throat. Another 30 people--most accused of kidnapping--face capital sentences and are awaiting the judgment of Chechen Sharia courts.

But with the signing of the oil deal, it appears that Chechnya’s defiance of Russia extends only so far. Some analysts suggested that the public punishments were a way of emphasizing the power of the government in Chechnya while it forges closer ties with its former enemy in Moscow.

“The coming public execution is designed to demonstrate to all those who might doubt or question the oil deal with Russia that small but proud Chechnya is quite capable of slapping Russia in the face and getting away with it as a sovereign state,” said Dzabrail Z. Gakayev, head of the independent Chechen Cultural Center in Moscow.

The oil pact will allow Russia to transport 200,000 tons of oil from Azerbaijan, on the Caspian Sea, through Chechnya to the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossisk.

Russia will pay Chechnya 43 cents a ton--which amounts to $86,000--plus a surcharge of $768,000.

Alexei V. Kuznetsov of The Times’ Moscow Bureau contributed to this report.