REFUGEES ASK FOR RESOLUTION OF CONFLICT.

REFUGEES ASK FOR RESOLUTION OF CONFLICT.

On March 4, the first conference of Chechen refugees residing in Ingushetia was held in the Ingush village of Ordzhonokidzievskaya. The chairman of the conference’s organization committee, Ruslan Budalov, noted that there are 170,000 Chechen refugees currently living in Ingushetia. The delegates to the conference called upon Vladimir Putin and Aslan Maskhadov to stop the fighting and to begin negotiations leading to a peaceful resolution of the conflict. The delegates also resolved that, once the refugees are able to return home to Chechnya, a referendum should be held to determine what the mutual relations of Russia and Chechnya should be (Kommersant, March 5).