Coca – The Dove from Chechnya

Houses burnt to the ground, streets destroyed by shelling, mothers crying over their dead children, mass graves full of mutilated bodies – such is the testimony of around 100 videotapes and films that have been taken out of Chechnya by women belonging to an organisation called 'The War Echo'. Using this documentation, they are trying to help assist Chechen civilians with cases brought before the International Human Rights Court in Strassbourg. Fifty–year–old Zainap is the heart of the organisation; she divides her time between documenting the situation in Chechnya and in the refugee camps of Ingussetia, transporting photographs and recordings to Germany and Russia and lobbying for the rights of the Chechen people throughout Europe. Together with her colleagues she tries to do everything she can for her country and prove to the world that Chechen terrorism is the desperate reaction of a small group of people, not the pastime of an entire nation. Swedish director Eric Bergkraut's documentary raises a number of unsettling questions. Can we really call the Russian military presence in Chechnya an anti–terrorist operation when more than 30 000 children and up to several hundred thousand civilians have died since 1994? Was Chechen president Ahmed Kadyrov right in claiming that Russia does not want to end the conflict because the Russian army profits from it? Who assassinated him a few months later, and why? And can the UN help the Chechens, when Russia holds the right of veto in the Security Council?