(The guy I shared a hotel room with last night -- no, not in THAT way -- is from Kabul. His wife is from Grozny [there's a combo for you!] I asked him what had happened to the Taliban and he said, "They were all CIA agents to begin with, they just shaved their beards.")
The Economist (UK) November 23-29, 2002 The conflict in Chechnya A chance of peace? In the aftermath of the Moscow hostage crisis, Chechnya may yet change SPUTNIK CAMP, INGUSHETIA
THEY live in neat rows of boxy green tents, in makeshift rooms partitioned with fibreboard in abandoned barns, in the houses of local families paid to take them in; they sit and wait out their days or look for work nearby or make the perilous journey back and forth to their old homes. But among all those who have fled the fighting in Chechnya, the refrain is the same: "We just want to live like normal people," says Azamat, a 21-year-old at the Sputnik camp, home to over 6,000 people, near Ingushetia's border with Chechnya.
At the height of Russia's second campaign against separatist rebels in Chechnya, which it began in 1999, there were 230,000 Chechen refugees (or "internally displaced persons", since they are inside Russia) in Ingushetia. Now there are 110,000—a ninth or a tenth of the Chechen population, depending on whether you believe aid agencies' estimates or the possibly inflated results of a recent census. Some have returned to Chechnya only to go into camps there. Others have ventured back to Grozny, the capital, where life struggles to regain some normality despite sporadic fighting and a military curfew.
Aerobics and exile
Though cramped, living conditions are not so bad. There are electric lights and roaring gas stoves, library tents and shop tents and school tents and aerobics tents. Groups of children with UNICEF's support travel to Moscow or even abroad to take part in competitions or perform concerts. But families are fragmented, the future unknown. Life is in suspended animation.
Aid workers have been bracing for a new influx, fearing a wave of repression after Chechen rebels took a Moscow theatre and its audience hostage last month. There are a few ominous signs: small army bases have been dug in right at the edge of the camps and some residents report harassment from the soldiers. In Moscow the police have been cracking down, sometimes brutally, on Chechens and other people from the Caucasus. But refugees and foreign aid workers who have been to Chechnya recently say it has not much changed. The army seems to be obeying President Vladimir Putin's instructions to exercise restraint.
In fact, Mr Putin seems to be using the hostage crisis to get more direct control in Chechnya—but not through force. It allowed him to discredit Aslan Maskhadov, Chechnya's last elected president and now its rebel leader, as a partner for peace talks on the grounds that he might have had a part in the theatre attack. (Russia is trying to extradite Akhmad Zakaev, Mr Maskhadov's foreign envoy, from Denmark, where he was arrested after a conference.) Mr Putin has also reshuffled most of the government officials responsible for Chechnya, except for Akhmad Kadyrov, the head of the Chechen administration in Grozny. This, says Nikolai Petrov, an analyst in Moscow, is designed to give Moscow more control over the region's finances, clipping Mr Kadyrov's wings.
He will be needed, however, to administer the next phase, which Mr Putin announced shortly after the Moscow hostage affair. In March or April next year there will be a referendum to adopt a constitution that will reiterate that Chechnya is part of Russia, formally negating its self-declared independence a decade ago. A few months later there will be a presidential election. Mr Kadyrov is a likely contender, but his own credibility is low both in Moscow and in Chechnya. Someone who is loyal to Moscow but has popular support too would doubtless do well. That might be a Moscow Chechen or, more likely, a recognised local politician.
The referendum and maybe the election, too, could be rigged; Russia tightly controls outside scrutiny of Chechnya, and public opinion is unknown. "The magic of the place is that we can't quantify anything," says an aid worker. But it may not be necessary. If the army's brutal excesses against civilians can be curbed, if the rebels do not grow stronger, and above all if Mr Putin's project promises some kind of return to normality, the Chechens—at least those who have known the refugee's life—may take what is on offer. And that would allow Mr Putin, shortly before his own re-election bid, to rescue some shreds of success from a policy towards Chechnya that so far has failed.