An introduction to the situation in the North Caucasus
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As said before, this blog is going to host mainly interviews of experts on the stabilization process in North Caucasus, but before starting with this, it is important to have an overview of the general situation. That is why this post is composed by a brief description of the North Caucasus and a summary of the significant events that occurred in the region since the collapse of the Soviet Union. I hope you will enjoy it!
The North Caucasus is a region of the Russian Federation composed by nine Republics, forming a corridor between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. The Caspian Sea provides a route to Central Asia and via the Volga to the internal territories of Russia. The Black Sea offers a route to Turkey, Ukraine, the Balkans, and through the Turkish straits to the Mediterranean world. In consequence, the North Caucasus has a geographical key position. In the region, mineral resources are present, mainly the oil fields in Chechnya opened in the twentieth century.
The North Caucasus region
International Crisis Group Europe Report N.221 (1)
The different regions of the North Caucasus are Kabardino-Balkaria, Karachay-Cherkessia, North Ossetia, Ingushetia, Chechnya, Dagestan, Adyghea, Krasnodar Krai and Stavropol Krai. Historically, the Russian advance into the Caucasus started in the seventeenth century. The North Caucasus shelters many ethnic groups, with cultural, religious and linguistic differences. The most numerous ethnic groups are the ethnic Russians (3 178 128), the Chechens (1 335 183), and the Avars (863 884). The majority of the population in the North Caucasus is Muslim, but some are Orthodox Christian, mainly the ethnic Russians and Ossetians. The main conflicts that occurred in the North Caucasus are the Russo-Chechen war and the tensions in Ingushetia. These conflicts had a huge impact on the region and generally spread to other Republics of the North Caucasus. (2)
Some authors and observers say that the Chechen wars have been the most violent in Europe in recent years in terms of ongoing military and civilian casualties. This war, which was expected to be “a small, victorious war” (3) by the president of the Russian Federation at the beginning of the 1990s, Boris Yeltsin, appeared to be a complete debacle for Russia for years and caused a total number of deaths estimated at 12,000 Russian fighters and 60,000 Chechens (fighters and civilians) (4) . What happened in Chechnya between 1994 and 1996 was an ideological war born from the growth of Chechen nationalist ideas and the will of the elites to take power and control the region, to get Chechnya’s independence from the Russian Federation. The war ended in 1996 with the withdrawal of the Russian troops and the de facto independence of Chechnya. However, the struggle between the Chechen elites, and the Islamisation of the region led to a second Chechen war, with the invasion of Dagestan by Chechen fighters in order to create an Islamic Republic unifying the two lands. After this intrusion in Dagestan, Putin ordered Russian troops to go back in Chechnya in 1999. The full-scale military offensive ended with the Russian seizure of Grozny, the Chechen capital, in 2000. Despite of the declared victory of the Russian government, Chechen nationalist resistance continued to inflict many casualties to the Russian troops. In 2003, a new Chechen Constitution was past, granting Chechnya a significant degree of autonomy while insuring its belonging to Russia. (5) Russia’s effort to suppress separatist and Islamic extremist movements has been successful only many years after the war first broke in the region. Russia’s pacification policy has involved the establishment of a pro-Moscow regional government and transferring always more local security duties to this government. A significant factor of the reach of a peace has been the reliance of Russia on pro-Moscow Chechen clans. Since the end of the second war, Russia’s effort to rebuild the devastated region has been significant but undermined by the corruption plaguing Chechnya. (6)
Another important conflict in North Caucasus appeared in Ingushetia. Just as Chechens, Ingushs are mainly Muslim and originally organized around clans. During the Soviet era, Ingushetia was part of the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Republic, which when the Union collapsed were divided into Ingushetia and Chechnya, two distinct Republics. When the two regions splat up, they proved unable to demarcate a common border, which contributed to tensions between Chechens and Ingushs. Furthermore, the Ingush population also experienced tensions with North Ossetian population. Indeed, Stalin’s World War Two deportation of the Ingushs (along with the Chechens for alleged collaboration with the German troops) generated conflict when the Ingushs came back to their land in the 1950s to find that some of the lands had been ceded to the North Ossetian Autonomous Republic. In 1992, hundreds of Ingush were killed and more than 60,000 were forced to flee from the region where they were living in North Ossetia because of this territory issue. (7) Following the recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia (South Caucasus regions) as independent states by Russia, violence in Ingushetia increased even more. According to the Open Source Center, the number of violent incidents in 2009 nearly matched that in Chechnya, the leader in such violence is the whole Caucasus. According to the same source however, the number decreased since 2010.
In the rest of the North Caucasus, the tensions spread. It spread to Dagestan, the region between the Caspian Sea and Chechnya. It is a multi-ethnic Republic which contrary to its neighbour, supported membership in the Russian Federation rather than separatism when the USSR collapsed. As said above, in 1999, some Islamic fundamentalists from Chechnya, willing to create an Islamic Republic in western Dagestan entered the country. Nevertheless, Russian and Dagestani forces calmed the insurgency. (8) Nevertheless, Islamist insurgency remains a significant factor of instability in the region. Fundamentalist Islam, in particular Salafism has been growing in the whole North Caucasus since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Its evolution in the different Republics has depended largely on how the local government and the security forces have treated conservative Muslim communities. (9) The first terrorist acts committed in the region were linked to the Chechen separatists, but it seems that most of the violence of the past years is the work of radical Islamists seeking to establish a Sharia based Emirate in the North Caucasus.(10)
To summarize, the North Caucasus has been the host of separatist ideas following the collapse of the Soviet Union. Moreover, the influence of Islamic fundamentalism that choose jihad in order to unify the North Caucasus regions into an Islamic Republic has spread, leading to the formation of terrorist groups in Chechnya, Dagestan, Ingushetia, Kabardino-Balkaria and Karachay-Cherkessia. (11) In consequence of the end of the Soviet era and the conflicts plaguing the region, North Caucasus now suffers from extremely high rates of unemployment and poverty. Dagestan and Ingushetia have the highest percentage of unemployment and poverty of all Russia. Corruption is also one of the main issues in the region, and the shadow economy is flourishing instead of the regular economy. This growth of the shadow economy is helped by the different conflicts and tensions, as they are a real opportunity for the elites’ greed. (12)
1. International Crisis Group, « The North Caucasus : the Challenges of Integration (I), Ethnicity and Conflict », Europe Report N.220, Oct 2012, p.7
2. Hunter. Shireen, “Conflict in the Caucasus and the Black Sea Region: Causes and Prospects for Resolution”, Hellenic Foundation for European Foreign Policy, 1997, p.3
3. According to Sergei Yushenko, chairman of the Duma Committee for Defense, these are the words of Oleg Lobov, then secretary of the National Security Council.
4. Zurcher. Christoph, The Post-Soviet Wars, Rebellion, Ethnic Conflict, and Nationhood in the Caucasus, New-York University press, 2007, p.100
5. Melvin. Neil, « Building Stability in the North Caucasus: Ways Forward for Russia and the European Union”, SIPRI Policy Paper, No.16, 2007, p.28
6. Nichol. Jim, « Stability in Russian’s Chechnya and Other Regions of the North Caucasus: Recent Developments”, Congregational Research Service, 2010, p.7-8
8. Zurcher. Christoph, The Post-Soviet Wars, Rebellion, Ethnic Conflict, and Nationhood in the Caucasus, New-York University press, 2007, p.92
9. International Crisis Group, « the North Caucasus: the Challenges of Integration (II), Islam, the Insurgency and Counter-insurgency”, Europe Report N.221, 2012, p.2
10. Melvin. Neil, « Building Stability in the North Caucasus: Ways Forward for Russia and the European Union”, SIPRI Policy Paper, No.16, 2007, p.1711. Nichol. Jim, “Stability in Russian’s Chechnya and Other Regions of the North Caucasus: Recent Developments”, Congregational Research Service, 2010, p.13
12. Fearon. James and Laitin. David, “Ethnicity, Insurgency and Civil War”, Stanford University, 2003, Vol.97, No.1, p.85
