Actress frees siege suspect

A suspected Chechen warlord was dramatically arrested at Heathrow airport and released when Vanessa Redgrave put up £50,000 bail.

Akmed Zakayev, 43, who is suspected of involvement in the attack on the Moscow theatre in which 169 people died, was held by Scotland Yard detectives as he stepped off a flight from Copenhagen.

He was briefly detained at a west London police station last night before being released after Miss Redgrave, who accompanied him on the flight, paid the money as a bail condition.

The Left-wing actress has backed the Chechen cause and has raised money for Chechen refugees. Zakayev is wanted by the Russian authorities for a list of alleged terrorist crimes committed during the Nineties including murder as well as alleged involvement in the theatre siege which Moscow police ended by pumping poison gas into the auditorium.

Zakayev is an envoy for the Chechen rebels who are fighting for independence from the Russian Federation. He is also chief aide to fugitive Chechen leader Aslan Maskhadov.

He was held in Copenhagen in a dawn raid by Danish police last month following a request from Russia. He was released when the Danish government said Russia had not produced enough evidence to justify his extradition.

Zakayev is now expected to claim political asylum in the UK which will plunge Home Secretary David Blunkett into the middle of an embarrassing diplomatic row.

Zakayev is due to appear before Bow Street magistrates court next week to begin extradition procedures but the case is expected to drag on for many months because both the extradition and the asylum processes allow for repeated appeals.

The international extradition warrant served on Zakayev lists 10 charges allegedly committed between 1996 and 2000.

They include one charge of murdering "not less than 300 militia officers" as well as charges of killing two Russian Orthodox priests.

He is also accused of being the "leader of the South Western Front who with others did levy war against the Russian Federation".

Zakayev, a former actor, has been considered a moderate among the Chechen rebel movement.

He condemned the guerrilla attack on the Moscow theatre but the Russian authorities claim he knew of it in advance.

Security forces used gas to disable the Chechen hostage takers and more than 500 people were treated in hospital for the effects of the gas.

Officials in Moscow want Zakayev extradited to face terrorism charges, some of which carry the death penalty. Mr Blunkett has given permission to proceed with an extradition case after a request to the Foreign Office by Russian diplomats.

However, the Russian stand on capital punishment could impede any possible extradition from this country. Russia will argue that Zakayev is wanted for trial in connection with acts of terrorism, but it is certain that his lawyers would say that he would face state persecution if he was extradited to stand trial in Moscow.

Britain's extradition laws are set to be overhauled in the coming months to dramatically streamline the system, but the rules would not be enforced retrospectively, so Zakayev would be dealt with under the existing rules and would be capable of spinning out a case with a succession of appeals, just as Argentina's General Augusto Pinochet did in resisting efforts to make him appear in the dock in Spain on genocide charges.