Group Assesses Plight of Chechen Refugees

Chechen refugees in the Russian republic of Ingushetia pleaded for help as a delegation from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe toured a tent city where thousands of people huddled in freezing cold and snow. “They are killing us both morally and physically!” one woman at the camp in Sleptsovskaya shouted during the visit by the group, which will try to assess what can be done to help the refugees. Since September, up to 200,000 people have fled the fighting in neighboring Chechnya, many of them now living in tents in Ingushetia. Russia began bombing Chechnya in September after Moscow blamed guerrillas in the separatist republic for raids in neighboring Dagestan and terrorist bombings that killed more than 300 people in Moscow and other cities.