Chechnya. The invisible war
Den usynlige krigen.
The Chechnyan war is a conflict the West is very reluctant to get involved with, for fear of provoking president Vladimir Putin. This book questions what is going on.
As an adviser on the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, Aage Borchgrevink is an international expert on the Caucasus. He tells the history of the region from the perspective of human rights activists, politicians, soldiers, refugees, and numerous other victims of Russia’s aggression.
We meet Buraeva, who has lost four children and a number of other relatives in the war, and who now lives in hiding with her only surviving son. At the other end of the social scale we meet the family of the elected Chechnyan president, Aslan Maskhadov, who was killed in March 2005. Major divisions run through the family, and creates a backdrop for Borchgrevink’s account of how, at times, it is impossible to determine who is the villain and who is the hero in this conflict.
Aage Borchgrevink is a committed witness, but also a thoughtful and poetic writer. The book is gripping but never sentimental, brutal, yet humane. It is an account of normal people who find themselves in abnormal situations.
Cappelen 2007
