--- Dwayne Monroe <idoru345 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> [Putin has, it seems, declared an end to previous
> approaches to
> terrorism. Given all that's happened in so short a
> time this is
> inevitable and appears to be a result of his
> realization the security
> forces are ineffective. We'll have to wait and see
> how the promised
> structural changes shake out. In the meantime,
> other trouble brews.
> Chris Doss informs me there is (as also mentioned at
> the end of the AP
> piece) a strong possibility of inter-ethnic warfare
> as a consequence of
> the Beslan slaughter.]
Note the paragraph:
> "Fathers will bury their children, and after 40 days
> (the Orthodox
> mourning period) ... they will take up weapons and
> seek revenge," said
> Alan Kargiyev, a 20-year-old university student in
> Vladikavkaz.
>
This is an Ossetian cry for blood feud against the Chechens and Ingush. We should count ourselves fortunate that half the terrorists were Arabs and not members of a Russian nationality.
Vremya Novostei September 3, 2004, "IT WILL LEAD TO GREAT BLOODSHED" The Caucasus may become one large hot spot again The hostage crisis could revive the Ossetia-Ingushetia conflict Author: Ivan Sukhov [The entire Caucasus could rapidly degenerate into a kind of Russian Bosnia - with an ethnic and religious conflict between Christian Ossetians and Muslim Ingushetians in the north, and an ethnic and territorial conflict between Georgians and Ossetians in the south.] hostage crisis could revive the Ossetia-Ingushetia conflict
"Whether or not the Ossetian-Ingush conflict is revived will depend on the outcome of the hostage situation," said Sergei Tobolov, director of the State TV and Radio Broadcasting Company of North Ossetia, formerly minister of nationalities of the North Ossetian Cabinet. "If everything works out more or less all right, we will probably managed to retain peace. If something happens to the hostages, we are in trouble. I don't even want to imagine what might happen."
For the time being, residents of Beslan gathered around the school are keeping calm. "Who told you they are Chechens or Ingushetians?" asks a woman who has some relatives among the hostages. "Whoever has heard the Chechen or Ingushetian language there?" Unfortunately, this composure and tolerance are unlikely to last. Moreover, even if there is nothing to the assumptions concerning ethnic composition of the gang, the rumors of "Ingushetian and Chechen mujahedin" have already spread.
Meanwhile, Beslan is on the edge of the Prigorodny district, the area that became a focus of discord between Ossetians and Ingushetians in autumn 1992. Ingushetians announced that the land had belonged to them before the deportation in 1944, and used force to seize the land. The attempt backfired. An ethnic purge followed and over 30,000 Ingushetians were forced to flee the Prigorodny district and seek shelter in Ingushetia.
Moscow put a lot of effort and money into attempts to have refugees return to their homes. It was particularly difficult to persuade the Ossetians, victims of the conflict, to let Ingushetians return to villages. Representatives of local government bodies did their best to prevent the return. Fearing another outbreak of enmity and therefore hostilities, they said that the psychological climate for the coexistence was wrong.
Some progress was made only in the last few years, particularly when Murat Zyazikov became president of Ingushetia. These days, however, observers fear that 12 years of work may be negated at a stroke by the terrorist attack in Beslan. At the very best, the process of reconciliation will be suspended.
Given the deterioration of the situation in South Ossetia, this whole region (known as Russia's outpost in the Caucasus) may rapidly degenerate into a kind of Russian Bosnia - with an ethnic and religious conflict between Christian Ossetians and Muslim Ingushetians in the north, and an ethnic and territorial conflict between Georgians and Ossetians in the south.
Sergei Arutyunov, Chief of the Caucasus Department at the Ethnology and Anthropology Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, agrees that "the conflict in the Prigorodny district may flare up again and it will lead to a bloodshed." He believes, however, that it may facilitate a solution to the South Ossetia problem.
"Russia's attention will diverted from South Ossetia, and it is precisely Russia that prevents crisis settlement. Cynical as it may sound, but the events in North Ossetia may prompt Moscow into facilitation of the peace process in the south. All this may result in South Ossetia's autonomy in Georgia," said Arutyunov. "International guarantees of the autonomy are preferable in this case. Russia dislikes international guarantees, it itself is used to being a guarantor, but unfortunately it has not been very successful as one so far. And there is nothing really wrong in the situation where peacekeepers are not only Russia, Georgian, and Ossetian but also from Honduras or Malaysia. Besides, it is not going to take a lot of peacekeepers. South Ossetia is not that large a territory."
Arutyunov doesn't think that escalation of the Ossetian-Ingush conflict may lead to unification with the area of tension in the east, in Chechnya - with the expanding zones of influence of Islamic fundamentalists in the western part of the Caucasus (Karachaevo- Cherkessia and Kabardino-Balkaria). "The situation there is not as tranquil at all, but I believe that a whole school full of hostages over there is less probable than, say, an explosion at a bus stop. Moreover, there have always been terrorist attacks beyond Chechnya and Ingushetia."
The expert believes at the same time that Dagestan should become a zone in the focus of special attention. "Some serious mess may take shape there because of the confrontation between official Makhachkala and the so-called Northern Opposition from Khasavyurt. The Mayor of Khasavyurt Saigidpasha Umakhanov is not a Wahhabi, but he is very religious. He is even a myurid (follower) of Sheikh Said- Magomed the Chirkei (a Muslim leader prominent in Dagestan). Moreover, this confrontation may lead to a much more horrible Avar- Dargin confrontation," Arutyunov said.
This correspondent visited Dagestan not long ago and found out that the war of rallies between Khasavyurt and Makhachkala will resume on September 10.
All Russia's counter-terrorism notwithstanding, the Caucasus is returning into the early 1990's when in the wake o the collapse of the Soviet Union it was boiling throughout from the Caspian to the Black Sea. Arutyunov makes a fairly pessimistic long-term prognosis in this respect. "Perhaps, Russia will retain the Caucasus in 2004 and 2005, but I have said already more than once that should things go awry, the Russian borders may shift to the northern bank of the Don. Something should be done to prevent it. Unfortunately, it is others who have been doing something so far."
Arutyunov assumes by the way that Russian politicians tend to misinterpret the decision of the UN Security Council on international support of Russia in its war on terrorism. "It is viewed as a carte blanche," he said. "In fact, it is a call for internationalization of the conflict in the Caucasus Russia cannot handle all alone anymore."
Translated by A. Ignatkin
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