10/03/2005 (Agence Europe) - Cecilia Malström (ALDE, Sweden), EP rapporteur on relations with Russia called on Javier Solana and Benita Ferrero-Waldner to elaborate an emergency EU strategy for Chechnya, following the assassination on 8 March of Chechen nationalist, President Aslan Maskhadov. Speaking on behalf of the same group, Emma Bonino deplored the “further step towards a military solution of the crisis in Chechnya…Maskhadov was the only potential negotiator for the Chechen side”. French Green Hélène Flautre also criticised this “barbaric operation, planned by the Russian secret services” against a man who had been fairly elected in 1997 during an OSCE validated election. She called for a special meeting at the EP foreign affairs committee on Chechnya, a meeting that should soon take place in Brussels.