Kadyrov's ultimatum to rebels expires today

The ultimatum delivered by Deputy Prime Minister of the Chechen Government Ramzan Kadyrov to Chechen separatists expires on June 10. Rebels who did not lay down arms within three days must be destroyed. Nevertheless there has been no mass surrender of the rebels to the authorities.

Meanwhile, a new statement issued by Ramzan Kadyrov on June 9 has caused an extremely negative reaction on the part of the republican population. In the evening of June 9, the son of the late Chechen president announced he was inclined to fight not only against rebels but against members of their families. "We will punish their relatives according to the law. They help bandits. And if there is no such a law, we will address the Russian State Duma with a request to pass such a law so that to make it possible to punish them. Otherwise the war in Chechnya will never end," he said.

Many people in the republic hold Ramzan Kadyrov openly declared that families and relatives of the Chechens fighting in the mountains would be destroyed from that moment on. As for the mention that it will be done "according to the law", the people are not inclined to give too much credence to this verbal rhetoric as nobody has observed laws in Chechnya over the last years. "If Kadyrov's people start attempting on rebels' families, women, old people and children whose fathers, husbands, sons and brothers wage war, it can lead to the most unexpected consequences. It will be an endless civil war, perpetual vendetta," Dukvakha, a 63-year-old resident of Grozny, said to the Caucasian Knot correspondent.

Editors note: See also the article "Kadyrov delivers ultimatum to rebels".