RUSSIA'S ARGUMENT for inducing Chechen refugees to return to their homes in Chechnya goes something like this:

The war there is over. Everyone would be better off back at home. Also, even though the war is over, the refugee camps, in the neighboring Russian republic of Ingushetia, are recruitment centers for young Chechens who want to fight Russians. No one can doubt that Chechens want to fight Russians, because Russian troops are still being killed in Chechnya every week, even though the war is over. The Russian soldiers are being killed in the villages that Chechen refugees are being urged to return to.

It's important to note, the argument continues, that the Chechens are part of the worldwide Islamic terrorist threat. That puts Russia on the same side as the United States and Europe, and it puts the Chechens on the other side. Even though the war is over. Of course Russia, benevolently, wouldn't actually force the 18,000 Chechens - or terrorists or whatever they are - who are living in the refugee camps to go home, because that would violate international laws.

Now, let's take a look at this.

About the refugees? Whether they're being forced out or not, deliveries of bread have been cut off and tents have been knocked down. Threatened with violence, refugees have been ushered onto trucks that have taken them back to Chechnya. Moscow says the return is voluntary; local officials in Ingushetia have, nonetheless, set a deadline of Friday for the refugees to get out.

About Chechnya? It's considerably more difficult for aid workers and reporters to see what's happening in scattered villages in a war-smashed and still-occupied region than it is to observe a refugee camp. That's why Chechens, living at home, are still being caught up in periodic sweeps, only to be found - dead - several days later.

About the war? Of course it's still going on. Killings - by both sides - and beatings, rapes, arson and looting - by just one side - have become business as usual. But if this is all neatly tucked out of sight, Russia can argue that it's fighting al-Qaida and be best friends with the West.

About Moscow's good intentions? In the face of three years of brutality and bloodletting, no one really expects there to be a true calling to account. But there was one case, involving the rape and murder of a Chechen girl named Elza Kungayeva, that looked as though it might be pursued if only for its symbolic value, to show that Russia wasn't entirely scornful of the idea of law and justice. A colonel, Yuri Budanov, was accused of the crime, and after many fits and starts his trial resumed Monday.

But the prosecutors have handled the case in such a way that Colonel Budanov has become a national hero among Russians. So maybe it was no surprise that two court-appointed psychiatrists testified that he was temporarily insane at the time of the killing, driven mad by the deaths of his own men. He is now expected to get off - a turn of events that has outraged even Russia's allies among the Chechens.

Chechnya has become a wretched sore, the very sight of which Russia would shield from a too-tender world. The world should thank Russia for its misplaced concern, and insist on looking anyway.