AT the sight of his son on the television screen, dressed in a camouflage jacket and cradling an AK-47 assault rifle, Buhari Barayev was overcome by emotion. Tears welled as the young terrorist declared that he had taken hundreds of innocent people hostage and would die a martyr unless the Kremlin halted the war in Chechnya.

It was the first time Barayev had seen the interview I conducted with his son Movsar during the Moscow theatre siege seven years ago. I had flown to Grozny, the capital of the Russian republic of Chechnya, to show it to him.

Movsar, who led about 40 heavily armed Chechen terrorists, had captured more than 800 theatre-goers. Two days after I entered the building to speak to him, he and his gunmen were dead, killed by Russian special forces. At least 129 hostages also died.

“I’m proud of my son — he died a martyr for his country,” said Barayev, who lost 25 relatives, including two brothers, in Chechnya’s wars with Russia. “But taking innocent people hostage was a mistake. I didn’t support that. It was a wrong and pointless act that would achieve nothing. However, that’s no reason to stop loving him. He acted out of despair.”

Barayev, 56, has devoted most of his life to the cause of an independent Chechnya. But in a remarkable change of heart, he has switched sides to become a vocal supporter of Ramzan Kadyrov, the ruthless, pro-Kremlin president of Chechnya.

The 33-year-old president, who is fiercely loyal to Vladimir Putin, the Russian prime minister, personally telephoned Barayev in Austria, where he had spent 10 years in exile, to ask him back and guarantee his safety.

Kadyrov, whose security forces have been repeatedly accused of abducting, torturing and murdering his opponents, greeted Barayev as an old friend in Grozny and drove him to his home for a banquet. He gave him a Volga car and is said to be helping him financially.

“Kadyrov is a man of his word and I trust him,” said Barayev. “I now realise that he has achieved in Chechnya what we always dreamt of. I became disillusioned with the rebel cause because it brought only death, suffering and empty promises.”

His decision has split his family. Islam, his youngest son, who stayed in Austria, has denounced it. Chechen rebels have branded him a traitor.

Barayev remains defiant. “I lost a son and much of my family for Chechnya’s battle for freedom. How dare anyone call me a traitor?” he said.

“I love my country and this is where I want to die. Kadyrov has turned it round and I urge any young militants still fighting to accept that they’re wrong. Life has never been better here. They should lay down their arms.”

Barayev’s defection is a propaganda coup for Kadyrov, who kept a lion cub as a pet before he took over as president in 2007. Wooing men like Barayev, who had called Putin “a criminal” and Russia “a heartless country”, is part of his drive to convince militants to rally behind his regime.

There is a longstanding tradition of warlord families changing sides in Chechnya. The president’s much feared security force, the Kadyrovsti, is made up of former rebels who fought the Russians before switching allegiance.

Similarly, Kadyrov and his father Akhmad, a former president who was assassinated five years ago, opposed Russia in the first Chechen war between 1994 and 1996, but sided with Putin when he launched the second conflict in 1999.

In return Putin gave him de facto control of Chechnya and turned a blind eye to the alleged brutality of the regime. Former rebels have been coerced into loyalty to Kadyrov, often by kidnapping their relatives. Money and positions of power have also been offered.

Kadyrov’s policy of granting amnesties has raised eyebrows in Moscow, especially among Russian veterans who are angry at seeing their former enemies being rewarded.

To them the Barayevs remain one of Chechnya’s most infamous terrorist families. Others back Kadyrov’s policy because it has reduced rebel numbers to fewer than 1,000 men.

Kadyrov claims he wants to reunite the Chechen people. Sceptics say he takes pleasure in watching his former enemies bow to his rule. “He loves hearing those who once called him a traitor sing his praises — he gets a kick out of it because it demonstrates his power,” said one.

There is no evidence to suggest that Barayev was forced to return. My interview was filmed by a cameraman for one of Kadyrov’s cabinet ministers, making it difficult to judge how freely Barayev spoke. He said he could not talk without an official present. “I am, after all, the father of Russia’s No 1 terrorist. I’m sure you understand.”

Grozny, which suffered the heaviest bombing in Europe since the second world war, has been largely rebuilt under Kadyrov. The city has the biggest mosque in Europe — an extravagant symbol for a country with a population of just over 1m.

No form of dissent is tolerated. Although Kadyrov himself denies any involvement, those who speak risk death. In July gunmen abducted and executed Natalia Estemirova, Chechnya’s most prominent human rights campaigner.

A month later the head of a children’s charity and her husband were found dead in the boot of their car.

Barayev confessed that he is afraid, but not of Kadyrov’s gunmen. Instead, he said, he feared a revenge attack by either Russians or Chechen militants.

It was Barayev’s younger brother, Arbi, who made the family a watchword for terror when, aged 21, he became a field commander during Chechnya’s first war.

“He was very tough,” Barayev recalled. “For him there was only one aim — to die a martyr. He was fanatical.”

After the Russian army left Chechnya in defeat, the republic fell under the militants’ control for three years. It became one of the most dangerous places on earth, plagued by kidnapping, arms running and bloody infighting among its warlords.

Arbi, who commanded 600 men, is said to have played a part in the kidnapping and beheading of four British mobile phone engineers in 1998. Barayev, who brought up Arbi when their mother died, vehemently denied it.

Barayev’s son Movsar became one of Arbi’s closest lieutenants. When Putin launched the second war, Barayev, who never took up arms against the Russians, decided to flee.

Certain that he would die in exile, he packed a small bag of Chechen soil, which he planned to have sprinkled over his grave. His brother and son stayed behind to fight.

Arbi was killed by the Russians in 2001. In 2002 Movsar, 25, by then a well-known rebel figure, was chosen to lead the terrorist group that staged the theatre siege.

His father last spoke to him by satellite phone shortly before the attack.

“He was in the woods with his unit,” recalled Barayev. “He sounded sick and I told him to join me in Azerbaijan to get medical help. He scolded me and said, ‘I’ll die here.’ Those were his last words to me.

“Eight weeks later a neighbour told me that Movsar was on television. When I saw him and heard what had happened I understood at once that it was over. My son would be killed. I was shocked.”

Movsar had been sent by Shamil Basayev, Russia’s most infamous terrorist, whose men later staged the Beslan school siege in North Ossetia that ended with the death of 333 hostages, most children. He was killed by an explosion in 2006.

When I met Movsar during the Moscow siege he betrayed no emotion as he explained he had come to die.

Russian special forces later pumped a powerful gas into the theatre and shot him with the other terrorists.

I asked Barayev what his son and brother would think of his backing for Kadyrov. He paused before replying. “They’d be angry,” he said.

“They’d strongly condemn my decision and I’d never manage to convince them that I’m right. But after all this suffering, one has to know how to accept defeat with dignity.”

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