Staunton, November 9 – Most observers focus on ethnic and religious issues as the drivers of protest in the North Caucasus, but in fact, North Caucasians have in addition to these concerns many other reasons to protest, some of which are typical of Russia as a whole and others regionally specific, according to Anton Chablin. […]
Staunton, July 30 – “The Russian special services have controlled” the flow of Islamist radicals from Russia to Syria “from the very beginning,” according to Elena Milashina of Novaya Gazeta. They haven’t interfered, and sometimes have assisted it, seeing “a threat to state security only in those who try to return from this war.” In […]
Six Islamist militants shot dead by police in Kabardino-Balkaria, a republic in Russia’s North Caucasus, were said to be members of ISIS. Welcome to our column, Russia Update, where we will be closely following day-to-day developments in Russia, including the Russian government’s foreign and domestic policies. The previous issue is here. Special features: – ‘I […]
Staunton, July 8 – One of the most cynical methods the Soviet government employed to divide and rule non-Russian nations was the establishment of republics with two titular nationalities because such arrangements guaranteed that the two were more likely to view the other as a problem and threat than to see Moscow as responsible. At […]
Staunton, June 6 – The economic crisis is leading to the de-industrialization of parts of the North Caucasus and that in turn is contributing to the flight of ethnic Russians from the region, a departure that is fundamentally changing the ethnic balance in many republics in that region. That trend can be clearly seen in […]
Staunton, June 5 – The contrast between the support Russian officials are giving to refugees from Ukraine and the complete absence of such support for Circassians fleeing from Syria is leading to the intensification of anti-Russian nationalism among the Circassians in the North Caucasus, according to Irina Babich. Babich, a senior scholar at the Moscow […]
Staunton, May 26 – As it has done so often, the Russian government is increasing repression outside the capital and thus outside the field of view of Western journalists and diplomats at a rapid pace, something it may be able to do even more effectively if Moscow media outlets follow the advice of some not […]
Staunton, May 21 — No nation more skillfully used an international event than did the Circassians during the Sochi Olympiad to call attention to the Russian-orchestrated genocide of their people 150 years earlier. Despite Moscow’s best efforts, few independent reporters talked about Sochi without talking about the continuing crimes against the Circassians. In the past […]
Staunton, April 30 – – Both Vladimir Putin and Ramzan Kadyrov have a deep interest in avoiding a complete break, the former because a new Chechen war would be “a moral catastrophe” that would undermine his myth and the latter because he would not survive without the enormous sums of money Moscow currently sends him, […]
Staunton, April 16 — For the last three months, the Russian population has been declining, and Moscow has coped with this by not publishing its usual monthly data collections or calling attention to the data in any way. But the regime is not capable of functioning without at least some officials having data, accurate or […]
