The following briefing paper on the history of conflict in Chechnya was
prepared by Mr. Edward Kline, President, The Andrei Sakharov Foundation.
Please, e-mail questions to Mr. Kline (ekline@inx.net).
This briefing paper provides background information on Chechnya, the land,
its people, its history, and the armed conflict now going on there.
Land and People
The Chechens are an indigenous people of the North Caucasus. They speak a
distinct Caucasic language, non-Slavic, non-Turkic, non-Persian, closely
related to the language of the neighboring Ingush. The Chechens and their
ancestors have apparently lived in their North Caucasus homeland for
several thousand years. Part or all of their territory has been overrun for
long periods by the Iranian Alans (ancestors of the Ossetins) in the 9-12th
centuries, by the Golden Horde in the 13th-15th centuries, and then by the
Russian Empire, which in a competition for domination of the North Caucasus
that began in the 16th century, finally bested its Ottoman and Persian
rivals.
The Chechens have traditionally been fiercely independent and democratic
mountaineers. Lermontov, the Russian poet, wrote in 1832: "Their god is
freedom, their law is war." From the 17th to the mid-19th century, the
Chechen tribes were converted to the Sunni branch of the Muslim religion,
with emphasis on its mystic Sufi form, which combines asceticism, the
search for personal union with God, submission of the novice or murid to
the sect's leader, and the glorification of ghazavat, or holy war, as a
defense against foreign domination. Their Muslim religion plays an
important role in Chechen society, although the ancient clan structure of
Chechen social and political life also persists, as do blood feuds and
other traditional customs.
The area of Chechnya is approximately 6,000 square miles, somewhat larger
than Connecticut. Its western border with the Ingush Republic has not been
definitively settled. Georgia, now an independent state, lies over the
mountains to the south; Dagestan, a Republic of the Russian Federation, is
to the east and north; the Stavropol Krai and the North Ossetin Republic
lie to the northwest. The northern half of Chechnya is a fertile plain
crossed by the Terek and Sunja rivers. The southern half contains the
wooded foothills rising to the northern slopes of the main Caucasus range.
According to the 1989 census, the population of the Chechen-Ingush
Autonomous Republic numbered 1,270,000. The districts now considered part
of Chechnya had 1,084,000 inhabitants, 715,000 of whom were Chechens,
269,000 were Russians (including Cossacks), and 25,000 were Ingush. In
1989, the population of Chechnya's capital, Grozny, was 397,000. Of these,
210,000 were Russians and 121,000 Chechens. Since the 1989 census, there
has been a substantial emigration of Russians from Grozny and Chechnya,
probably in excess of 100,000 persons even before December 1994. Chechens
living elsewhere in the USSR in 1989 numbered 242,000 with 58,000 in
Dagestan, 50,000 in Kazakhstan, 19,000 in Ingushetia, and 2,000 in Moscow.
The Chechens have been primarily herdsmen and farmers. According to the
1989 census, 70% of all Chechens still lived in rural areas. The rich
oilfields surrounding Grozny have been exploited since 1893. Although
recent petroleum production is declining (in 1992 slightly exceeding 3.5
million tons), Grozny has remained a major center of refining (about 6.5
million tons of petroleum in 1992) and of petrochemical production. It is a
hub for rail and road transport, as well as for important oil and gas
pipelines. (There is speculation that Russia's interest in controlling the
pipeline for Caspian oil may have been a major factor in the decision to
send the Russian army into Chechnya.) Employment in Grozny's oil industry
attracted many Russians -- the city's population grew from 97,000 (68,000
Russians) in 1926 to 397,000 (210,000 Russians) in 1989.
The Russian Constitution (Article 65) lists the Chechen Republic as a part
of the Russian Federation. However, in 1990 a secession movement began to
gain force, and on November 2, 1991, Chechnya proclaimed its independence.
On March 17, 1992, a constitution was adopted; it defines the Chechen
Republic as an independent, secular state governed by a president and a
parliament.
History
The Russian Conquest
Russia's systematic attempt to subdue and occupy the North Caucasus region
dates from the late 18th century and the military campaign begun in 1783.
Sheik Mansur, a Chechen, led the resistance from 1785 until his capture in
1791. But resistance to Russian occupation did not end.
From 1824 until 1859, Imam Shamil led the Muslim peoples of the North
Caucasus in a long, bloody war against the Russian invaders. The Russians
won by sheer force of numbers, and by carrying out a policy of relentless,
destructive total war from fortress towns such as Grozny, founded in 1818
by the Russian general, Alexander Ermolov. After the surrender of Shamil,
the Commander-in-chief of the Russian forces, Prince Bariatinski declared
"in the name of the Tsar, the Russian government leaves you forever free to
profess the faith of your fathers... The authorities in charge of your
government will exercise their authority according to the shariat [Muslim
written law which regulates the civil, social, and family life of all
believers] and the adat [Muslim customary law which varies from people to
people]." But, as Richard Pipes wrote in The Formation of the Soviet Union,
"The Chechens and Ingush presented a special problem. Inhabiting the nearly
inaccessible mountain ranges bordering on Dagestan, they were always, from
the Russian point of view, a troublesome element. Unassimilable and
warlike, they created so much difficulty for the Russian forces trying to
subdue the North Caucasus that, after conquering the area, the government
felt compelled to employ Cossack forces to expel them from the valleys and
lowlands into the bare mountain regions. There, faced by Cossack
settlements on one side, and wild peaks on the other, they lived in abject
poverty tending sheep and waiting for the day when they could wreak revenge
on the newcomers and regain their lost lands."
Beginning in 1859, many Chechens were deported to or sought haven in the
Ottoman Empire. (A Chechen diaspora exists to this day in Turkey, Jordan,
and other successor states of the Ottoman empire.) Even after Shamil's
surrender, the Caucasian War continued on a reduced scale until 1864, and
there continued to be intermittent outbreaks of armed resistance to Russian
imperial rule in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, most notably in
1877-78.
The Soviet Period 1918-1944
In May 1918, seizing the opportunity offered by the Russian revolution, the
peoples of Dagestan and the North Caucasus formed a North Caucasian
Republic and declared their independence. For the next three years, as
civil war raged in the former Russian empire, a fierce struggle was waged
for control of the Caucasus.General Denikin, the leader of the
anti-Bolshevik Volunteer Army attacked and defeated the forces of the North
Caucasian Republic, but in the fall of 1919 Sheikh Uzun Haji organized a
North Caucasian Emirate in the mountains of Chechnya and led the
anti-Denikin resistance. Denikin was forced to withdraw. The Bolsheviks,
who earlier cooperated with Sheikh Uzun Haji, installed a regime of
military occupation. This led to a new outbreak of fighting in August 1920.
In January 1921 in Vladikavkaz, a Congress of Mountaineers was convened,
and, with the personal participation of Stalin, a Soviet Socialist
Autonomous Mountain Republic (including the Chechens, Ingush, Ossetins,
Kabardians, Balkars, and Karachai) was established. The Republic's
constituent assembly accepted Soviet sovereignty in return for recognition
of the shariat and adat as the basic law of the Republic, full autonomy of
the Republic in domestic affairs, and the transfer to the Republic of
territory which had been taken from Mountain peoples by the Tsars.
In November 1922, Chechnya was detached from the Mountain Republic and
given the status of an Autonomous Oblast of the Russian Federation, one
step in the progressive erosion of Bolshevik pledges to respect the
mountain peoples' autonomy. The collectivization campaign of 1929 sparked a
new cycle of rebellion and repression. In 1934, the Chechen and Ingush
Autonomous Oblasts were merged, and in December 1936, prior to the adoption
of a new Soviet Constitution, their status was elevated to a Chechen-Ingush
Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR). However, the purges of 1936-38
led to the execution and imprisonment of thousands of Chechens and the
stiffening of anti-Soviet sentiment.
In January 1940, Hassan Izrailov assumed the leadership of the Chechen
anti- Soviet guerillas, declaring in a letter to the Soviet leaders: "For
twenty years now, the Soviet authorities have been fighting my people,
aiming to destroy them group by group: first the kulaks, then the mullahs
and the `bandits', then the bourgeois-nationalists. I am sure now that
their real object is the annihilation of our nation as a whole."
After the German army invaded Russia in June 1941, Chechen guerilla actions
and Russian countermeasures intensified.
1944 Deportation
In November 1942 German units were approaching Vladikavkaz and had reached
Mozdok on the road to Grozny, but they had to retreat when the German 6th
army was cut off at Stalingrad later that month. Although the Germans never
occupied Chechnya, on February 23-24, 1944, the Chechens and their
neighbors the Ingush were systematically rounded up by Russian troops and
shipped off to the east in freight trains.
The Soviet census of 1939 had counted 407,690 Chechens and 92,074 Ingush;
altogether some 400,000 Chechens and Ingush were deported to Soviet Central
Asia, the majority to Kazakhstan. It is estimated that 30% or more died
during their detention and transport from the Caucasus or within the first
year of their forcible resettlement. The decree ordering the deportation
and abolishing the Chechen-Ingush ASSR was dated March 7, 1944. It
explained the action as follows: During the Great Patriotic War, and
especially during the time the German-Fascist army was operating in the
Caucasus, many Chechens and Ingush betrayed their motherland, went over to
the side of the fascist occupiers, enlisted in detachments of saboteurs and
spies sent by the Germans into the rear of the Red Army, in response to
German orders formed armed bands to fight against Soviet power, for several
years have also taken part in armed actions against the Soviet authorities,
and for a long time without engaging in honest work have conducted bandit
raids against the collective farms of neighboring regions, robbing and
killing Soviet people. Therefore, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet
orders:1. Deportation to other regions of the USSR of all Chechens and
Ingush living on or adjacent to the territory of the Chechen-Ingush ASSR,
and liquidation of the Chechen-Ingush ASSR. ...
Exile and Return: 1944-1957
The behavior of the Chechens in exile in Kazakhstan has been described in
The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: "there was one nation that
would not give in, would not acquire the mental habits of submission -- and
not just individual rebels among them, but the whole nation to a man. These
were the Chechens. They were capable of rustling cattle, robbing a house,
or sometimes simply taking what they wanted by force. They respected only
rebels. And here is an extraordinary thing -- everyone was afraid of them.
No one could stop them from living as they did. The regime which had ruled
the land for thirty years could not force them to respect its laws."
On February 25, 1956, in Khrushchev's speech to the 20th Party Congress
exposing Stalin's crimes, he mentioned the Chechens among the peoples
deported toward the close of World War II, commenting: "no reasonable man
can grasp how it is possible to make whole nations responsible for hostile
activity, including women, children, old people, Communists and Komsomols,
to use mass repression against them, and to expose them to misery and
suffering for the hostile acts of individuals or groups of individuals."On
July 16, 1956, following Khrushchev's signal, the Presidium of the USSR
Supreme Soviet issued a decree abolishing the legal restrictions that had
been imposed on the deported Chechens, but specifically ruled out claims
for return to their homeland and restitution of confiscated property.
On January 8, 1957, a further decree of the Presidium reconstituted the
Chechen-Ingush ASSR, and cancelled the ban on the return of Chechens and
Ingush. The horror of their mass deportation and the misery of their
resettlement regimen in Kazakhstan and Kirghizstan have not been forgotten
or forgiven by the Chechens.
Perestroika in Chechnya: 1987-1991
Perestroika initiated a period of renewed unrest in Chechnya. Chechen
intellectuals began by attacking the officially-sponsored historian Vitaly
Vinogradov's view that Chechnya had voluntarily joined Russia. In 1988, a
proposal to build a biochemical plant in the town of Gudermes aroused
widespread popular opposition. In summer 1988, a Chechen-Ingush Popular
Front was formed, which rapidly progressed from ecological to political
slogans. In June 1989, for the first time a Chechen, Doku Zavgaev, was
elected first secretary of the Communist Party in the Chechen-Ingush ASSR.
Various civic action groups began to organize, and on November 23, 1990, a
Chechen National Congress (CNC) was convened, with the consent and
participation of Zavgaev. The Congress passed a resolution calling for the
"sovereignty" of the Chechen-Ingush Republic and elected Jokhar Dudaev
chairman of its Executive Committee.
Dudaev was born in a Chechen village in January 1944 and was deported with
his family to Kazakhstan a few weeks later; he returned to Chechnya with
his parents in 1957, pursued a successful military career, joined the
Communist Party in 1966, and became a Major General in the Soviet air
force. From 1987 to 1991 he commanded the strategic bomber group based in
Tartu, Estonia, and from 1989, he commanded the garrison in that city. (In
Estonia, he is still a popular hero because of his sympathetic attitude
toward the Estonian national movement.) Early in 1991, after his election
as chairman of the CNC executive committee, Dudaev retired from the Soviet
air force. He is still listed as a major general in the reserves, and is
legally entitled to a general's pension. He is married to a Russian, with
whom he has three children (a son was wounded during the current fighting
in Chechnya). Dudaev has been described as charismatic, intelligent,
energetic, authoritarian, erratic, hotheaded, single- mindedly dedicated to
the independence of Chechnya.
On November 27, 1990, prodded by the CNC's resolution, the Supreme Soviet
of the Chechen-Ingush ASSR adopted a "Declaration on the State Sovereignty
of the Chechen-Ingush Republic." Since "sovereignty" was also proclaimed at
this time by other Soviet Republics, the Chechen-Ingush declaration, which
was endorsed by Zavgaev, did not cause particular concern, despite the
implicit upgrade in status from that of Autonomous Republic within the
Russian Federation.
In spring 1991 when the CNC again convened (June 8-9), the more radical
faction was in the majority. In a speech to this Congress published in a
Grozny newspaper, Dudaev declared that the Soviet Union and its instruments
of colonial oppression -- the Communist Party, the KGB, the Ministry of
Internal Affairs, and the Procuracy -- had robbed the Chechen nation of its
"religion, language, education, science, culture, natural resources,
ideology, mass media, leadership cadres, and rights to freedom and life."
He acknowledged that "the price of genuine sovereignty is great," but
rejected proposals to accept diminished sovereignty in exchange for
economic stability, asserting that it was absurd "to presume that the
Chechens will ever be reconciled with their present miserly colonial
freedom."
The CNC concluded its gathering by calling for early parliamentary and
presidential elections, for adoption of a new consitution and a law on
citizenship, and for a referendum on the Republic's status. The CNC set as
prerequisites for signing a treaty with the USSR or Russia the
unconditional recognition of the Chechen nation's right to independence,
compensation for crimes committed against the Chechen nation, trials of the
guilty, and establishment of a government based on democratic principles.
The Separation of the Ingush
The actions of the CNC presented their neighbors the Ingush with a dilemma.
Chechens and Ingush are related by ties of language, religion, and culture,
and have been traditional allies, joined together under the Soviets in the
Chechen-Ingush ASSR. The Ingush, however, have tended to be less
irreconcilable in their hostility to Russian influence.
In 1991 their chief concern was to regain ancestral territory to the west,
the Prigorodny raion bordering Vladikavkaz. In 1944, when the Chechen and
Ingush were deported, this region was transferred to the North Ossetin ASSR
and it had not been returned to the Chechen-Ingush ASSR after its
reconstitution in 1957. (The northern Naursky and Shelkovsky districts,
however, were incorporated into the Chechen-Ingush ASSR for the first time
in 1957.) On April 26, 1991, the RSFSR Supreme Soviet passed a Law on the
Rehabilitation of the Repressed Peoples promising in Article 6 "the
restoration of the frontiers of their national territories existing before
the frontiers were changed by anti-Constitutional force." The Law also
provided for a discretionary transitional period before implementation of
this provision.
Ingush leaders believed that their claims to Prigorodny raion could best be
achieved by remaining within the Russian Federation. The June 1991 meeting
of the CNC suggested that the Ingush decide their own political status and
determine their relationship to Chechnya by a referendum. On September 15,
1991, an assembly of Ingush deputies passed a resolution calling for the
formation of an "Ingush Autonomous Republic within the RSFSR." A referendum
conducted (November 30-December 1, 1991) in three predominantly Ingush
districts approved the proposed separation from Chechnya.
The Ingush decision was accepted by Dudaev and his followers. It was in
effect confirmed by the RF Supreme Soviet on June 4, 1992, when it adopted
a law "On the Creation of the Ingush Republic in the Rus-sian Federation."
This law failed, however, to fix the boundaries of the newly established
Ingush Republic, providing instead in Article 5 that a Russian Federation
government commission should consult with all parties concerned and propose
a solution for the frontier issue by December 31, 1993. The failure to
resolve promptly the question of Prigorodny rayon led to fighting between
Ossetins and Ingush in October 1992, with several hundred people killed and
many homes destroyed, the expulsion of almost all Ingush from Vladikavkaz
and Prigorodny rayon, and the establishment by the Russian Federation of a
state of emergency administration for the affected region.
General Ruslan Aushev, president of Ingushetia, and Boris Agapov,
vice-president, have tried to keep Ingushetia out of the current war in
Chechnya, while at the same time serving as a constructive intermediaries
for the opposing parties.
The Chechen Revolution: August-December 1991
Political passions continued to heat up in Chechnya during the summer of
1991. They boiled over following the failed August 19-21 coup attempt by
reactionary forces in Moscow. Zavgaev was then in Moscow to sign the
proposed Union treaty. Almost all officials in Grozny either favored the
putschists or avoided taking sides by calling in sick.
In contrast, on August 19, Dudaev and the CNC Executive Committee issued a
decree denouncing the plotters as "a group of government criminals,"
appealed to "the population of the Chechen Republic to show perseverance,
determination, and courage in defending democracy and human dignity," and
called for "a campaign of civil disobedience." Large demonstrations in
Grozny's main square supported Dudaev and the CNC. Zavgaev, who returned
from Moscow on August 21, and the official establishment in Chechnya never
regained control of the situation in Chechnya; on August 22 Dudaev's
followers seized the Grozny television station; on August 24 they pulled
down Lenin's statue in the town center; by the end of August a national
guard was formed; on September 1-2 the third session of the CNC passed a
resolution transferring power in Chechnya to its Executive Committee; and
on September 6 the National Guard stormed a meeting of the Chechen-Ingush
Supreme Soviet, forced Zavgaev to sign an "act of abdication," and
manhandled and dispersed the deputies. In the melee, Vitaly Kutsenko, the
first secretary of the Communist Party City Committee, jumped from a
third-floor window and died as a result of his injuries.
The leaders of the Russian Federation, having defeated the attempted coup
and now striving to replace the disintegrating administrative structures of
the USSR, sought to assert their authority over the Chechen-Ingush
Republic. On August 26, Aslanbek Aslakhanov, a Chechen, a general in the
Ministry of Interior, and chair of the Russian Supreme Soviet's Committee
on Legality and Public Order, was sent down to Grozny; he urged Zavgaev and
the authorities, who were still recognized by Moscow, to refrain from the
use of force in dealing with civil disobedience.
On September 11, Gennady Burbulis and Mikhail Poltoranin were dispatched
from Moscow by the Russian Republic's leadership to try and restore order.
On September 14, Ruslan Khasbulatov, a Chechen elected in 1990 to the RF
Supreme Soviet from Grozny and its acting chairman after June 1991, arrived
in Grozny to broker a deal among the conflicting forces. In an interview on
September 7, he had called Zavgaev a tool of Moscow and a supporter of the
putsch. On September 15, at a special session of the Chechen-Ingush Supreme
Soviet, he persuaded the deputies to remove Zavgaev and to disband, in
anticipation of new parliamentary elections, which were set for November
17. A 32-member Provisional Council, drawn from various political factions,
was appointed to exercise executive power in the interim. Nevertheless, the
political struggle between the radical nation-alist forces, grouped around
Dudaev and pushing for independence, and the conservative establishment,
trying to preserve the status quo, continued.
The Provisional Council, unwieldy and divided, split into competing blocs,
and the CNC declared that elections for parliament and a president would be
held on October 27.On October 6-7, General Alexander Rutskoi, then
Vice-President of Russia, accompanied by Andrei Dunaev, RF Minister of
Internal Affairs, and Viktor Ivanenko, chairman of the RF KGB, visited
Grozny and met with Dudaev and representatives of the different factions
contending for power. Rutskoi, on his return to Moscow, reported to the
Russian Federation's Supreme Soviet that Georgia's President, Zviad
Gamsakhurdia, was behind the unrest in Chechnya, and that Dudaev's "gang",
which was terrorizing the population, numbered only 250 men.
On October 8, the Presidium of the RF Supreme Soviet adopted a Resolution
on the Political Situation in the Chechen-Ingush Republic, which expressed
"serious concern regarding the situation in the Chechen-Ingush Republic"
where "the escalation of violent actions by illegal formations is
continuing" and "the life, rights, and property of citizens of the
Chechen-Ingush Republic are subect to growing danger." The Presidium then
declared that the Provisional Council was the only legitimate state power
in the Republic, that this Provisional Council should take all necessary
measures to stabilize the situation, that "illegal armed formations" should
hand in their weapons by midnight October 10, and that the forthcoming
elections should be held on the basis of the Russian Federation's existing
legislation.
On October 9, speaking on Russian television, General Rutskoi called the
CNC Executive Committee members "criminals." His attacks were seconded by
Khasbulatov, who assured the Supreme Soviet that the overwhelming majority
of the Chechen people wanted to remain in the Federation. On October 19,
President Yeltsin ordered all in Chechnya to submit to the terms of the
Resolution of October 8 within three days.Dudaev in response announced
mobilization and expansion of the Chechen National Guard; 50,000 persons
demonstrated in his support in Grozny. Elections were held on October 27,
the date proposed by the CNC, and, according to Andrei Illarionov's and
Boris Lvin's article "Should Russia recognize Chechnya's Indpendence?"
(Moscow News, no. 8, 1995), 458,144 persons (72% of the eligible voters)
participated. Running against three competitors for the presidency, Dudaev
received 412,671 votes (90% of the ballots cast). Several candidates had
withdrawn, complaining of unfair election practices.
The Russian authorities refused to recognize the election as valid,
claiming that only 15% of eligible voters participated and that existing
legislation had not been respected. Now it was the turn for groups opposing
Dudaev to demonstrate in Grozny, and in December, Umar Avturkhanov, an
officer in the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the recently elected mayor
of the Nadterechny Raion in the north of Chechnya, announced that he would
not obey Grozny's commands. On November 7, President Yeltsin declared a
state of emergency in the Chechen-Ingush Republic. The newly-elected
Chechen parliament responded by voting emergency powers to Dudaev, who
ordered martial law in Chechnya and mobilized the National Guard. When
planes carrying Russian troops landed at the airport near Grozny, their
deployment was blocked by Chechen forces.
On November 10, the RF Supreme Soviet voted to withhold the confirmation
required by Russian law for prolongation of Yeltsin's state of emergency
decree. Probably the dominant factor in the Supreme Soviet's decision was a
reluctance to use the Russian army to intervene in a domestic political
dispute, a reluctance reinforced by the recent August events in Moscow. The
Russian troops were evacuated from Grozny airport in what was regarded as a
defeat for the Chechen policy of Rutskoi, Khasbulatov, and Yeltsin.It is
interesting how events in Grozny during fall 1991 reflected and often
seemed to anticipate analogous events in Moscow.
"Independence" 1992-1994
After Russia`s failure to reassert effective sovereignty over Chechnya in
November 1991, an extended stalemate developed. Chechnya attempted to
assert the prerogatives of an independent sovereign state, while Russia
continued to regard the Chechen Republic as part of the Russian Federation
and subject to its laws-- the Chechen Republic is listed in Article 65 of
the 1993 Constitution as one of the 89 subjects of the Russian Federation
and the two seats in the Council of the Federation assigned to Chechnya are
listed as vacant. Nevertheless, an uneasy modus vivendi prevailed for two
and a half years, despite intermittent sound and fury. Some attempts were
made to negotiate a resolution of the conflict, but Russia mainly followed
a policy of benign neglect, except in the international arena where its
adamant stance prevented any state from extending diplomatic recognition to
the Chechen Republic.
Dudaev turned out to be an erratic and quarrelsome president. Suzanne
Goldenberg, author of The Pride of Small Nations: The Caucasus and
Post-Soviet Disorder, describes her visit to Grozny and her audience with
Dudaev as follows:
Everywhere one sees men in various menacing guises, loitering with a
disregard for time that seems closer in spirit to Peshawar, say, than to
Moscow. The village elders with heavy sheepskin coats and cutlasses, the
suspected mafiosi with gold teeth, fedora and black coat of movie
gangsters, the bored soldiers -- these are the people with power in Grozny.
They preen themselves in front of some of the finest cars in Russia --
Mercedes, Saabs, and other imports -- clasp each others shoulders in a
quick hug in the Islamic style of greeting, mutter "salaam" and move on. On
Thursday mornings the square is resrved for the dancers, who, according to
local Sufi or mystical traditions, move at speed in dizzying circles and
patterns meant to induce a religious ecstasy.In Moscow's newspapers and on
television, the leader of independent Chechnya, General Jokhar Dudaev, is
portrayed as a dangerous lunatic. Amid all the Russian prejudices against
Caucasians, there is a particular contempt for Chechens. They are depicted
by the media as a nation of thugs and criminals, relying on strong-arm
techniques to safeguard their claim on the takings of Moscow's drug
dealers, prostitutes, arm merchants, and smugglers. Although there is
almost certainly a Chechen presence in Moscow's underworld, this fact is
blown out of all proportion. As a Chechen foreign ministy official
complained: "Some journal-ists who come to the Chechen Republic see only
the limousines, they can't see the poor people, or the people fighting for
their freedom. The main purpose of this idea of the Chechen mafia is to
hide the struggle of a people for independence." At first glance, General
Dudaev does indeed appear strange. His grip on affairs is so complete that
it is impossible even to get a hotel room in Grozny without his personal
intervention. Visitors seeking an audience stand waiting for six hours at a
stretch in a corridor of heavily armed bodyguards, pacing and smoking. When
they do reach the inner sanctum, Dudaev is invariably behind his desk, a
strategy to hide the fact that he is very short. Wary but smiling in
civilian clothing, he greets visitors from beneath the new green velvet
national flag. The emblem of freedom shows a seated wolf on a mountain top
in the light of a full moon. The green represents Islam, and the wolf the
uncompromising independence of the mountain people.In November 1991, when
Russian pressure was at its height, Dudaev released 640 prisoners from
Grozny's prison to help defend Chechnya's independence. Many subsequently
became members of the National Guard or of Dudaev's personal bodyguard. In
early 1992, soon after Chechnya's declaration of independence, there were
raids on Russian weapons depots in Chechnya, possibly instigated by Dudaev.
Chechnya became a major supplier of Russian arms to the Bosnian Muslims,
and allegedly an important base for drug dealers as well. Even sympathetic
observers have called the Dudaev government's management of the Chechen
economy a disaster; the blockade and other other sanctions imposed by
Russia, even though they were only haphazardly enforced, accelerated the
economic decline.When Dudaev clashed with parliament in June 1992, he
announced the introduction of direct presidential rule. After speaker of
the Chechen parliament Husein Akhmadov met in January 1993 with Ramazan
Abdulatipov, chair of the Russian Supreme Soviet's Council of
Nationalities, and Sergei Shakhrai, then chairman of the State Committee on
Nationalities, and signed a letter of intent to negotiate a treaty with
Russia, the conflict between Dudaev and the parliament escalated. It
culminated in Dudaev's dissolution of the parliament and a June 1993 battle
in Grozny between the National Guard and supporters of the parliament,
which claimed more than 100 victims. Dudaev made Grozny the seat of the
Confederation of Caucasian Peoples, a loosely structured and not very
effective organization of fifteen peoples. The Confederation was intended
to encourage the belief that a union of the indigenous peoples of the
Caucasus is possible and could produce a viable independent state, but it
also aroused Russian fears of Chechen meddling in Russia's ethnic
Republics. Dudaev's grant of political asylum to Zviad Gamsakhurdia when he
was ousted as Georgia's president in January 1992 and, later that same
year, the sending of Chechen volunteers to assist Abkhazians in their fight
for independence from Georgia only added to these fears.Despite official
policy not to discriminate against Russians and to encourage them to remain
in Chechnya, economic depression, interethnic incidents (many involving
Cossacks in Chechnya's northern districts), fears of crime, and a
reluctance to live as a minority in a Chechen-speaking and Muslim-oriented
state led to a substantial increase in the emigration of Russians from
Chechnya after 1991. A letter from an emigrant from Grozny published in
Argumenty i fakty, no. 6, 1995, provides insight into a Russian's
perception of interethnic relations before the war:Three years have passed
since Dudaev came to power, and during that time 200,000 Russians have left
Chechnya [this figure seems somewhat exaggerated], abandoning their homes,
or selling them for a pittance. We Russians from Chechnya lost everything:
our homes, possessions, friends, jobs. It was the Russians who developed
the Republic's economy. No Chechen ever worked at a lathe or in the
dangerous conditions of the oil refineries. They considered such jobs
degrading. They would say "we have our white slaves -- the Russians."Now
everyone's calling the Chechens poor unfortunates! Rackets, terrorism,
counterfeiting, theft and armed robbery are the occupations "a real
Chechen" considers worthy of him. "Go back to your Russia!" they screamed.
And did everything to make their wish come true. And almost all Russians
left. The Chechen people got what they wanted, and there's no reason to
feel sorry for them. Chechnya's industry has been devastated. Sewage flows
in Grozny's streets, and there's no water, electricity, heat. What can be
done about it when earlier everything was supplied by Russian workers --
the Chechens thought that to get water you turn on the taps, to get light
you throw the switch, and that's all there is to it.Calamities can really
be understood only by persons who have suffered them. I'm not a
nationalist, but I'm absolutely sure that the government has to be tough in
taking care of Dudaev's gang, because Grozny is Russia, it's our town built
by our ancestors.
1994 - Mobilization
After Russia's failure to establish effective control over Chechnya in
November 1991, despite all the real and alleged sins of the Dudaev regime,
despite its anti-Dudaev propaganda campaigns and its fitful economic
blockade of Chechnya, Moscow largely followed a policy of peaceful
coexistence with the Grozny authorities until spring 1994. Russia's
adoption in December 1993 of a Constitution and the simultaneous election
of a Federal Assembly more Russian nationalist in outlook seems to have
triggered a reassessment of the Chechen question.
On February 15, 1994, Russia and Tatarstan signed a treaty affirming
Russian sovereignty but granting Tatarstan substantial domestic autonomy.
Tatarstan had been the only Republic other than Chechnya which had refused
to sign the March 1992 federal treaty. Dudaev, while acknowledging the
desirability for Chechnya of close economic relations with Russia,
apparently declined suggestions to follow Tatarstan's course and refused to
enter into negotiations until Russia recognized Chechnya as an independent
state and a subject of international law.
Pressure mounted in Moscow to do something about Chechnya. Nationalists
wanted to reassert Russian rule by force. Liberals wanted to bring Chechnya
within the framework of the Russian Constitution and the rule of law by
means of a process of peaceful negotiation. The average Russian was angered
by stories of Chechen abuse of local Russians and saw Chechnya as a
dangerous center of mafia activities. Almost no one in Russia or abroad
called for recognition of Chechnya's independence.At the same time, local
opposition in Chechnya to Dudaev had grown because of the Republic's
failure to win international recognition, Dudaev's erratic and
authoritarian behavior, a severe economic slump, and increasing crime,
corruption, and clan rivalry. Some districts of Chechnya had come under the
control of the opposition, notably Nadterechny raion, dominated by Umar
Avturkhanov, who in December 1993 organized a Provisional Council as a
potential alternative government for Chechnya and appealed to Moscow for
assistance.
In the spring of 1994 Yeltsin and his advisors apparently decided to
provide covert financial and military assistance to the opposition in
Chechnya in hopes that Dudaev could be overthrown and that a reconstituted
Chechen government would accept the Russian Constitution and the status it
granted to the Chechen Republic. Implementation was assigned to the Federal
Counterintelligence Service (FSK -- the principal successor to the KGB),
headed by Sergei Stepashin. On June 29, while on an inspection tour of
Russian troops in the North Caucasus, Defense Minister Pavel Grachev
announced that Russia intended to develop in the region a powerful mobile
army group that would be available to help Ministry of Interior forces with
domestic security operations.
July 1994 saw the beginning of a gradually escalating, low-intensity
conflict between Dudaev and the Russian-backed opposition, although it
seemed initially more a battle of propaganda and disinformation, of alarms
and excursions, rather than conventional military warfare.On August 2,
Avturkhanov claimed on Russian TV that his Provisional Council (PC)
exercised effective power in Chechnya, and Russian Prime Minister
Chernomyrdin asserted that the time had come to take "concrete measures"
against the Dudaev regime in Chechnya, but promised that Russian military
force would not be used. Moskovsky Komsomolets reported that FSK's deputy
director Evgeny Savostyanov (later dismissed) had clandestinely visited the
North Caucasus and covert operations against Chechnya were being stepped
up.
On August 6 there was a battle between pro-Dudaev and opposition forces in
the Nadterechny raion. On August 10, a meeting was held in Grozny of clan
chieftains, village elders, and Muslim religious leaders, who voted to
proclaim a holy war (gazavat) if Russian troops invaded Chechnya. On August
29, Ruslan Khasbulatov agreed to cooperate with Avturkhanov's PC. (Dudaev
had offered Khasbulatov asylum in Chechnya after Yeltsin disbanded the
Russian Supreme Soviet in September 1993. Khasbulatov has played an
ambiguous role in recent Chechen events, seemingly courted and also
distrusted by all sides.) September 1-6 there was fighting between Dudaev's
forces and opposition forces commanded by Beslan Gantemirov (elected mayor
of Grozny in 1991), Ruslan Labazanov, and Avturkhanov. The Dudaev forces
won this round despite the opposition's use of tanks and alleged support by
Russian helicopter gunships. Fighting broke out again on September 13. Two
of Grozny's television transmitters were blown up on September 15. On
September 30, opposition forces claimed to have destroyed most of
Chechnya's air force in an attack on the Grozny airport. On October 14-16,
there was an attack, including helicopter strikes, on Grozny's suburbs: an
army barracks and ammunition dump were blown up before opposition forces
withdrew. Dudaev's forces captured Urus-Martan, Gantemirov's headquarters,
on October 19, and a month-long lull in the fighting followed, but on
November 17 near the village of Bratsk, Dudaev's troops engaged a column of
tanks en route from North Ossetia to reinforce the PC forces.
The war entered a new phase in late November. On the 25th, 40 helicopters
with Russian insignia attacked the Grozny airport and on the 26th the
opposition launched a blitzkrieg tank attack on Grozny which penetrated up
to the President's Palace. The attack fizzled out the next day, and the
Chechens captured about seventy Russian soldiers who had manned the tanks.
It was later disclosed that FSK had recruited them for this operation from
regular army units. On November 29, President Yeltsin issued a 48-hour
deadline for all factions fighting in Chechnya to surrender their weapons
-- it was ignored. After General Grachev admitted on December 5 that
Russian warplanes had bombed targets in Chechnya, which had earlier been
denied, and that Russian soldiers had participated in the November 26
attack on Grozny, Dudaev met him in North Ossetia and agreed to release the
captured Russian soldiers.
On December 8, President Yeltsin convened a special meeting of Russia's
Security Council. The following day he issued Decree No. 2166, "On Measures
to End the Activity of Illegal Armed Formations on the Territory of the
Chechen Republic and in the Zone of Ossetin-Ingush Conflict," which
stated:The Security Council of the Russian Federation has established the
presence of illegal armed formations, whose actions over an extended period
of time have led to bloodshed, the loss of life, and violation of the
rights of citizens of the Russian Federation on the territory of the
Chechen Republic and several districts of the North Caucasus.In accord with
paragraph 5 of Article 13 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation,
activity directed toward violation of the Russian Federation's integrity,
subversion of state security, creation of armed formations, or instigation
of ethnic and national hatred is prohibited and is unlawful.On the basis of
Article 80 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, I decree the
following:1. I charge the Russian government in accord with points (e) and
(f) of Article 114 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation to use all
available state means to ensure the security of the state, the rule of law,
civil rights and liberties, the defense of public order, the fight against
crime, and the disarming of all illegal armed formations.2. This Decree
enters into force from the date of publication.The Decreee was dated
December 9, 1994. On the same day, the Russian government issued a
resolution ordering the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) together with
the Ministry of Defense "to disarm illegal armed formations on the
territory of the Chechen Republic." The Ministry of Defense was ordered to
destroy aircraft, armor, artillery and heavy weapons that were not
surrendered or confiscated. The MVD and FSK were authorized to detain
suspects, and deport non-residents from Chechnya. A special commission was
set up to accredit correspondents in the war zone and to "ensure objective
reporting of events in the Chechen Republic."
Chechnya: War
On December 11, Russian troops invaded Chechnya from the north, the east,
and the west.The first two months of the war in Chechnya -- the nature and
scale of the fighting makes "war" the appropriate term -- was reported in
detail by television and the press both in Russia and abroad, although
coverage has fallen off sharply since January 19, when Russian troops
occupied Grozny's Presidential Palace.
Despite forecasts of a quick victory, Russian troops made slow progress in
advancing on Grozny, held up by unarmed civilian protesters as well as by
Chechen troops and a lack of supplies and seasoned soldiers. The Chechen
forces are made up of the National Guard and other regular army units,
including many soldiers with Afghan war experience; the volunteer militia,
subject also to central command and discipline, in which a great proportion
of able-bodied Chechen males participate, some on a part-time basis; and
"the avengers," individuals or small groups, whose relatives have been
killed, and who, acting on their own, seek blood vengeance in accord with
Chechen custom. The Chechens' weapons, which include some artillery and
armor and plentiful supplies of sophisticated anti-tank weapons,
Kalashnikov automatic rifles, ammunition, and grenades, are Russian in
origin. They were handed over to the Chechens in 1991, seized during raids
on Russian arms depots in 1992, or bought at various times from corrupt
Russian officers and other arms dealers. The Chechens lack American
Stingers or equivalent Russian anti-aircraft weapons; this leaves them
vulnerable to Russian helicopter gunships.
Russian air raids and artillery fire have been employed, in accord with
traditional Russian military doctrine and practice, to prepare the way for
ground offensives against Chechen positions. Initially, their use was
relatively restrained. As Chechen resistance stiffened, however, the
bombing and shelling of Grozny and of other population centers (including
some in Ingushetia), as well as of military and industrial targets,
escalated. Frederick Cuny, in his article Killing Chechny (The New York
Review, April 6, 1995), describes the Russians' tactics: "To put the
intensity of firing in perspective, the highest level of firing recorded in
Sarajevo was 3,500 heavy detonations per day. In Grozny in early February,
a colleague of mine counted 4,000 detonations per hour. Only in early March
did the Russians diminish their shelling and adopt a strategy of starving
out the local population."
An all-out Russian assault on Grozny was launched on December 31, but it
failed to achieve its main objective, the taking of the President's Palace.
Russian armor and troops found themselves trapped in the city streets,
leading to fierce battles and heavy casualties --many Russian soldiers were
trapped in armored personnel carriers and incinerated.It was not until
January 19, after more than a month of hard fighting and the total
destruction of central Grozny, that Russian troops were able to occupy the
President's Palace. After another three weeks of combat, the Russian
command claimed that it controlled the city of Grozny, but its control is
tenuous and is contested nightly by Chechen snipers and patrols. In
mid-February, a brief respite was arranged, after which the war resumed. On
Monday, February 13, in Ingushetia, MVD Colonel General Anatoly Kulikov,
commander of Russian forces in Chechnya, and Russian army commander General
Anatoly Kvashnin met with Dudaev's chief of staff, Colonel Asland Maskadov,
and agreed on a heavy weapons cease-fire. In further meetings, on February
15 and 17, the two parties negotiated a 48-hour total cease-fire permitting
an exchange of prisoners, recovery and burial of the bodies of dead Russian
and Chechen soldiers, as well as the first delivery of humanitarian aid to
Grozny by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on February
18.
Unfortunately, hopes that this limited truce might become a starting point
for a settlement of the conflict were dashed when talks were broken off.
Chechen forces regrouped to the east of Grozny around the towns of
Gudermes, Argun, and Shali, and also in the hills to the south of Grozny.
Until mid-March, fighting was sporadic, with Russian forces slowly
consolidating their positions, sometimes by negotiating agreements with
local Chechen authorities, sometimes by air and ground attacks on Chechen
positions. On March 20, Russian forces began a new offensive to take Shali
and Argun; heavy bombing, strafing, and shelling of Chechen positions in
and around the towns were followed up by tank and infantry attacks. If the
road junctions of Shali and Gudermes are captured by the Russians, the
Chechens' access to Dagestan will be seriously reduced. Even if the
Russians' present offensive succeeds, however, Cuny (in the article cited
above and written on March 9) notes that at some point "the Russians must
turn south ... and confront the Chechen forces massed in the south.
Undoubtedly, the Russians can inflict major damage on the Chechens. The
question for Yeltsin is how far he is prepared to go ... to win, the
Russians will have to force half a million or more people into the
mountains, cut off their food supplies, and starve them into submission."
The Conduct of the War: Violations of Humanitarian Law
Sergei Kovalev, Russia's Commissioner for Human Rights, has taken the lead
in publicizing the human cost of the war in Chechnya and denouncing the
gross violations of human rights and humanitarian law that have occurred.
On December 15, he led a 5-man group to Chechnya to monitor the war there.
(The original team included Kovalev, deputies of the State Duma Valery
Borshchev, Mikhail Molostvov, and Leonid Petrovsky, and expert of the
Memorial Society's Human Rights Center Oleg Orlov. Deputies Yuli Rybakov
and Alexander Osovtsov later joined them.) While in Grozny, Kovalev sent to
Moscow a series of bulletins and appeals reporting on the war's horror:
Every day we see planes dropping bombs on residential areas with complete
impunity. Every day we see the bodies of civilians torn apart by these
bombs, some without heads, others without legs. Many places in the city of
Grozny resemble the section of Stalingrad left unrepaired in order to serve
as a war memorial. There was a military hospital next to the building where
we slept in Grozny before the December 31 attack. The hospital's head
doctor told me that a shell had come through the roof during the attack.
Fortunately, no one was killed directly. They had to interrupt an operation
to amputate the arm of an elderly Russian woman who had been badly wounded
by shrapnel, but they managed to complete the surgery later in a make-shift
operating room in the basement. Other patients who couldn't receive
necessary treatment because of the attack on the hospital died. By the time
we returned to the site, it was too late to see anything -- the hospital
had burned down.Boarding school 2 was hit, but fortunately all 43 children
were in the basement. None were hurt, and they were evacuated to the
village of Stary Atagi. I hope they'll be all right there, but according to
recent unconfirmed reports, Stary Atagi has been bombed. Many other Chechen
villages have been bombed, including, Urus-Martan which is sheltering more
than 1,000 refugees.Anna Volkova, a very old woman, is sitting on the
sidewalk with the few possessions she saved from her fourth floor apartment
which was destroyed by a bomb. Next to her lie the bodies of her son and
daughter-in-law covered by a blanket. Volkova is sitting on a stool behind
a small cart covered with a flannel blanket -- passersby leave money for
the funeral on it.During the attack, a house on Central Square, not far
from the President's Palace, was set on fire. Alexander Pavlovich, a World
War II veteran, managed to lower himself on sheets from his fourth-floor
apartment to the third floor where he was saved by Chechen militiamen.
Neither he nor the militiamen were able to rescue his wife, who was
paralyzed. She cried out: "Save me! Save me!" before she burned to
death.Grozny's ruins are overloaded with bodies -- the bodies of Russian
soldiers. Stray dogs gnaw at the dead.
Kovalev returned to Moscow on January 5 to describe directly to President
Yeltsin the observations of his group. On January 10, he submitted a report
to the Russian State Duma, detailing the group's "finding that gross
violations of human rights and the norms of humanitarian law have been
committed in the war zone on the territory of Chechnya and in parts of
Ingushetia," and adding:
On the basis of our analysis of information gathered, together with
official communiques, eyewitness testimonies and documents published by the
media, we can responsibly assert that: 1. In the war zone, the Russian side
is conducting military operations using modern heavy weapons and aircraft
for indiscriminate attacks which are causing a) large-scale death and
maiming of the civilian population in Chechnya; b) the destruction of
housing and other civilian objects indispensable for survival; c) damage to
and disruption of medical institutions, the destruction of ambulances and
other medical conveyances, including some marked with the Red Cross
insignia; d) the destruction of cultural objects; e) serious damage to
installations involving potential hazard to the environment. 2. Necessary
measures for the protection and evacuation of the civilian population
located in the war zone are not being taken by either side; 3. The Russian
side is not taking adequate measures for finding, removing, and burying the
dead; 4. The Russian side is obstructing shipment to the war zone of
humanitarian assistance, including lifesaving medical supplies needed for
the wounded; 5. The Russian military authorities, officials, and
government-controlled information services are unreasonably withholding
information and conducting a campaign of deliberate disinformation, which
is spreading such evident lies about events in the Chechen Republic as: a)
false information about the time and nature of military operations, leading
to civilian victims and the destruction of civilian targets ... c) the lie
that there have been no rocket or bomb strikes ... d) concealing military
losses and the names of those killed, wounded, or missing in action, and
those taken prisoner. The Chechen side has also falsified information for
purposes of propaganda. 6. The Russian side has continually hindered the
activity of correspondents in the war zone, in a manner unrelated to the
legitimate protection of military secrets. In addition, a number of
credible eyewitnesses have reported that force has been used to interfere
with reporters, as well as other instances of mistreatment of journalists,
threats to them, and confiscation of their materials. Facts have become
known about coercion of the press in Moscow as well....The Russian federal
authorities are refusing to recognize that the events in Chechnya
constitute a "non-international armed conflict." Their actions on the
territory of the Chechen Republic are grossly violating the norms of
international humanitarian law, and in particular, the June 8, 1977
Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions of August 12, 1949. The Russian
Federation is a party to Protocol II, which relates to the protection of
victims of non-international armed conflicts.The use of military weapons
and the conduct of military operations as noted above, which have led to
the death and maiming of many civilians; to the destruction of objects
indispensable to the survival of the civilian population; the destruction
of irreplaceable cultural objects; the military authorities' obstruction of
the shipment of humanitarian supplies to Grozny; and the failure to take
measures for finding, removing and burying the dead are gross violations of
Articles 4, 8, 13, 14, 16, and 18 of Protocol II.
Kovalev's testimony on the war's human cost was echoed in the observations
of a 5-man fact-finding mission to Moscow and Chechnya (January 23-29)
under the auspices of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in
Europe (OSCE) and led by Istvan Gyarmati, Personal Representative of the
OSCE Chairman-in-Office. His 20-page report includes the following comment:
The humanitarian situation is a catastrophe of serious proportions.
According to General Babichev 150,000 people, predominantly Russian, old,
sick, women and children, are trapped in the ruins of the city. The Russian
forces cannot cope with the situation without help from civilian Russian
authorities and international humanitarian aid. The need for humanitarian
aid is very large in all parts of Chechnya and the neighboring regions.
Detained Chechens in the prison wagons in Mozdok we met had been badly
beaten and were in urgent need of medical care.There have been other
allegations of torture and summary execution of Chechen civilians detained
by the Russian army and sent to screening facilities in Mozdok and
elsewhere in the region. There are also credible reports that Russian
soldiers were guilty of looting, indiscriminate shooting and other violence
during the siege and taking of Grozny.
Lorenzo Amberg, from the Swiss Department of Foreign Affairs, led a second
5-man mission to Moscow, Chechnya, and North Ossetia (February 22-March 1)
under OSCE auspices to investigate the humanitarian and human rights
situation. The summary of the Group's Report states "that the most urgent
problems are the distribution of relief goods and access of the ICRC to
Chechnya, the security of the civilian population and refugee problems. The
Mission believes the fundamental issue remains a negotiated ceasefire as
the condition for any substantial improvement."
Pressed by the West, the Russian government has agreed in principle to a
continuing OSCE presence in Chechnya and the adjacent region, but the terms
of reference for the mission have not been published. Based on statistical
analysis of refugees' eyewitness reports, Edward Gelman, a member of
Kovalev's staff, has estimated as many as 24,000 civilian deaths between
November 25 and January 25 due to the war; he estimates that 19,000 of them
were the result of bombing and shelling. Civilian deaths in all Chechnya
during that period may have exceeded 30,000.In an interview on March 23,
Col. General Kulikov reported that 1,253 Russian army soldiers had been
killed and 3,563 wounded during the war up to that date; 132 Ministry of
Interior troops had been killed and 876 wounded. In addition, an earlier
report had acknowledged 400 Russian soldiers missing in action. Several
sources have issued substantially higher estimates for Russian casualties
-- Frederick Cuny, for one, believes more than 5,000 Russian soldiers have
been killed. So far, no reliable figures on Chechen army casualties have
been published.
James Collins, a US State Department official, in his testimony given to
the US Helsinki Commission on January 27 cited estimates of 455,000 persons
displaced by the fighting, of whom some 260,000 are in Chechnya proper,
130,000 in Ingushetia, 45,000 in Dagestan, and 20,000 elsewhere. The cost
of reconstruction of housing, essential infrastructure, and industry has
been estimated at more than $1,000,000,000. Jonas Bernstein wrote in the
Wall Street Journal (March 20) that Grozny's "city center now resembles
Dresden 50 years ago, and the Russian government ministers who recently
inspected the damage there say it is beyond repair." The city's
infrastructure -- water, gas, and sewage lines -- has been severely damaged
as well as the housing stock. The recent Russian offensive may have
inflicted comparable damage on Argun and Shali.
Proposals for a Peace Process
On January 11, Sergei Kovalev issued proposals for a ceasefire and a
peacemaking effort in Chechnya. Kovalev has repeatedly stressed that
negotiations must include General Dudaev's representatives, since they
alone have authority with Chechen combattants.In order to end the bloodshed
in the Chechen Republic and move toward political settlement of the
conflict, I propose the following principles for peace negotiations. They
have been drafted taking into account my conversation with Russian Prime
Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin and with representatives of the Chechen side.
First Steps. 1. Immediately halt use in the war zone of aircraft,
artillery, tanks and other armor, massed rifle fire, and grenade launchers.
Snipers should be recalled. The Chechen side to be responsible for
controlling its militia detachments and vigilantes. Movement of troops or
weapons within Grozny without the express consent of both parties to be
strictly forbidden. 2. As soon as agreement is reached for a temporary
ceasefire, a joint Military Control Commission will be organized and
empowered to decide all questions with respect to the ceasefire agreement.
Further Steps. The first order of business of the Commission should be
finding solutions to the following problems:-- sufficient physical
separation of the opposing sides to preclude the exchange of rifle fire.
Establishment of a complete ceasefire. The lines to which the armed forces
of the opposing sides must withdraw will be fixed by the joint Control
Commission. Military activity of any kind will be forbidden in the security
zone between the perimeters of the opposing sides;-- the removal of the
dead and the evacuation of wounded federal soldiers and civilians and of
noncombattants wishing to leave Grozny;-- a mutual exchange of prisoners by
the parties to the conflict after appropriate negotiations;-- extension of
the agreement to the entire territory of the Chechen Republic. As soon as
this has been achieved, a complete ban on the introduction onto Chechen
territory of any units of the Russian Armed Forces;-- the staged withdrawal
of units of the Russian Armed Forces from the Chechen Republic and their
replacement by units under the command of the Ministry of Internal
Affairs:-- negotiations seeking the Chechens' return to federal control of
armor and other heavy weapons and the simultaneous withdrawal from Chechen
territory by the federal forces of artillery, tanks and other armor.
Further airstrikes -- whether using conventional bombs or rockets -- to be
prohibited;-- redeployment of regular military units of the Russian Armed
Forces and the Ministry of Internal Affairs to permanent stations following
Chechen guarantees not to attack them. The police to be assigned
responsibility for maintaining law and order. Proposals for a Political
Settlement. In pursuit of a subsequent broad political settlement, I
consider it advisable to:-- conduct in the Chechen Republic a national
round-table conference which would define the fundamental principles of
Chechnya's internal government structures and select a delegation to
negotiate with Russia's federal authorities;-- conduct negotiations without
preconditions between delegations representing Russia's federal authorities
and Chechnya about regulating their relations;-- begin preparations for and
as soon as practical convene a Caucasian Peace Conference with
representatives of public organi-zations of the peoples of the Caucasus and
representatives of the government bodies of the republics, territories, and
regions of the North Caucasus. The Conference should work out and propose
to the government bodies of the Russian Federation and the Chechen Republic
a plan for a peace settlement in Chechnya. In the future, the Caucasian
Peace Conference might be accorded permanent status and assigned the task
of working out proposals for the normalization of the situation in the
region as a whole, including settlement of the Ingush question.Observers,
including international observers, may take part in the negotiations and
settlement.
Self-determination vs Territorial Integrity of States
The crux of peace negotiations, when they take place, will be the clash
between the principle of self-determination and the internationally
recognized right of sovereign states to defend their territorial integrity
and the inviolability of their frontiers. Several neutral observers have
suggested that Chechnya should recognize Russian sovereignty, and Russia in
return should grant Chechnya broad autonomy in ordering its domestic
affairs, similar to that enjoyed by Tatarstan in Russia, the Aaland Islands
in Finland, or Puerto Rico in the United States. Few are willing to address
what should be done if the Chechens reject Russian sovereignty, bring up
the "long train of abuses and usurpations" by Russian governments over the
last two hundred years, and assert that "it is their right, it is their
duty to throw off such government" and become an independent nation-state.
There is no easy, no finally just solution to the Russian-Chechen conflict,
nor to other similar, deep-rooted inter- ethnic confrontations. Competing
interests must be acknowledged, and all possible solutions, including
secession, population exchange, and various models of political or cultural
autonomy with possible international oversight, candidly explored. Unless
we are willing to condone the crime of genocide, we should resist the now
fashionable idea that nations are artifical constructs. We should recognize
that the Chechens constitute a people, a nation. They, like other peoples,
enjoy the right to self-determination, which should be exercised with due
respect for the rights of other peoples and nations. We should at the same
time acknowledge that the right of self-determination does not necessarily
mean international recognition of every people as an independent, sovereign
state.March 24, 1995
Edward Kline
Select Bibliography:
English-language
* Marie Broxup, editor. The North Caucasus Barrier, Hurst, London, 1992.
The articles by Abdurahman Avtorkhanov "The Chechens and the Ingush
during the Soviet Period and its Antecedents," and by Marie Broxup
"Russia and the North Caucasus" and "After the Putsch" are especially
valuable.
* Suzanne Goldenberg, The Pride of Small Nations: The Caucasus and
Post-Soviet Disorder, Zed Books, London, 1994.
* Paul Henze, Chechnia: A Report of a Fact-Finding Mission, September
23-October 3, 1992, International Alert, London,
Russian-language
* Timur Muzaev, Zurab Todya, Novaya Checheno-Ingushetiya, Panorama,
Moscow, 1992. Politicheskii landshaft Rossii (The Political Landscape
of Russia), January 1995, Center for the Study of Political Geography,
Moscow. The January 1995 issue of this new journal, devoted to
articles on the Chechen conflict, is up-to-date and useful.
Acknowledgments:
Professor Andrew Blane
Professor emeritus of Russian history at City University of New York
and secretary of the Human Rights Project Group, made a great many
constructive contributions to the content and style of this briefing
paper.
Frederick C. Cuny
An emergency management consultant, spent three weeks in January and
February 1995 assessing the humanitarian situation in Chechnya and the
surrounding region. His article in the April 6 New York Review of
Books and a meeting with him provided important information on the
situation in Chechnya.
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