Anna Politkovskaya and other internal critics of the existing regime in Russia. Politkovskaya remarked that Bush and Blair's "war on
after the events of September 11 had been of enormous help to Putin. Putin and others, she maintained, were now more able to openly use similar racist and islamophobic arguments alongside greater Russian chauvinism to justify Russia's occupation of Chechnya.
Given that the Chechen people are almost overwhelmingly Muslim the Chechen resistance was now increasingly portrayed as Russia's home grown branch of the Islamicist 'axis of evil'.
Similarly, as Politkovskaya also pointed out, the abuses in Abu Ghraib prison, Guantanamo Bay, revelations of the use of torture, CIA secret prisons etc were also used to justify any number of human rights abuses against the Chechen people.
Tens or even hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths took place in the First and Second Chechen Wars.
In 1999 a series of bombings of Russian apartment blocks over a period of two weeks killed over 300 people. The bombings were blamed on Chechen separatists and were used to justify the invasion of Chechnya in what became the Second Chechen War.
In the book he co authored Blowing up Russia: Terror from Within the murdered Russian political exile Alexander Litvinenko argued that the 1999 bombings had in fact been orchestrated by the FSB (Federal Security Service, successor to the KGB) to justify the invasion and reoccupation of Chechnya. This also facilitated Putin's Russian President in 2000, as the 'hard man' who could deal with the rebellious Chechens.
Whether true or not Litvinenko's allegation cannot be dismissed out of hand. Firstly as a former officer in the FSB Litvinenko would have been better placed than most to understand the political psychology of his former working colleagues.
Secondly Litvinenko himself was not the first or only person ever to make this allegation. Others both inside and outside Russia having arrived at the same conclusion given that there was an abundance of circumstantial evidence pointing to FSB involvement in the bombings.
Anna Politkovskaya and Alexander Litvinenko were not the first political opponents of Putin to have been murdered for their journalistic activities.
Politkovskaya was the thirteenth journalist murdered in Russia since Putin's election in 2000. Unlike the killings of her twelve murdered predecessors Politkovskaya's murder only attracted attention in the west because she was far better known there.
The message sent out from Russia though is clear: anyone who attempts to expose the political subterfuge and corruption in Russia today could well end up paying for it with their own lives. The recent murder of Alexander Litvinenko in London by radiation poisoning has shown that this principle also applies to Russians in exile.
There are also weapons other than political murder that are being used to stifle dissent. A law recently signed onto the Russian statute books by Putin has been clearly designed to restrict the activities of NGOs.
The new law requires all non profit organisations to register with the newly established Federal Registration Service. Furthermore they will also be required to supply full details of their membership, financial records including sources of finance as well as records of all meetings.
This law has actually attracted the opposition of religious leaders. As churches are now legally deemed to be non profit organisations, the law, theoretically at least, now requires priests to supply the names and addresses of everyone who attends their congregations, and even the dates of these congregations.
The law is so extensive that strict compliance with the letter of the law is virtually impossible. This will give the Russian government carte blanche to take action against any NGO or campaigning organisation it considers to be troublesome.