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Where there is no law, but every man does what is right in his own eyes, there is the least of real liberty
Henry M. Robert

Captives of the Caucasus

29 May, 1999 - 00:00

By Vitaly PORTNYKOV, The Day
Sergei Stepashin made his first trip as Russian Premier to the Caucasus.
His concern about a small territory known as Karachay-Cherkess Autonomous
Republic is understandable and its size is not the point but the scope
of possible interethnic conflict there.

The Communists left the Russian leadership an amazing legacy. Where
one can find some logic in the formation of the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous
Republic (since both parts are inhabited by the Vainakhs, although it was
the first post-Soviet structure to split after the empire's collapse).
The logic of multinational Dagestan can also be understood (it is impossible
to draw any ethnic boundaries there). But why Kabardino-Balkaria or Karachay-Cherkessia?

Conflict between the Kabardinians and Balkars (the latter came up with
the idea of creating a republic of their own) has been assuaged so far,
perhaps because the national elites on both sides could come to terms.
In Karachay-Cherkessia the gap between the Karachay and Cherkess has become
obvious only now after the first general presidential elections. Mr. Stepashin
offers the national elites compromises, showing that the Russian Premier
has learned from the Chechnya experience: a conflict should be stopped
at the earliest stage, rather than taking one's time making plans to halt
it later. Whatever the outcome, someone will feel they are the loser; the
Karachay will if their candidate, General Vladimir Semnov, loses the elections;
the Cherkess will if he becomes President... The Karachay are numerically
stronger, yet the Cherkess will defend their right to take part in running
the republic.

The author of these "dual republics," Stalin, was a quite a joker! He
made his descendants eternal captives of the Caucasus, to be precise, of
Caucasian problems, as though trying to prove long after his death that
this land can be ruled only by an iron hand; that any form of democracy
will result in ethnic confrontations, separatism, and breakup among federation
members. Former Soviet republics found a more or less effective remedy
by becoming independent, but finding a remedy in Russia is proving much
harder.

 

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