![Sample our Area Studies journals, sign in here to start your access, latest two full volumes FREE to you for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5922/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Area-Studies.jpg"})
Abstract
How does state repression of non-militant Muslims contribute to violent Islamism in the North Caucasus? This article considers the case of the republic of Kabardino-Balkaria, where young residents' embrace of normative Islam post-perestroika roiled the Sovietized Muslim and secular establishments. Greatly aggravated by the brutal and indiscriminate response from law enforcement agencies, this confrontation culminated in the 2005 Nalchik uprising, the North Caucasus' largest insurgent offensive of the past decade. In the culturally comparable nearby republic of Adygeya, by contrast, analogous state repression in the wake of the uprising did not produce a violent outcome. Salient features of the mosque–state relationship in both republics are examined here, particularly the rationale of Kabardino-Balkaria's Muslim opposition leaders before and after their public endorsement of militant jihadism. The author then posits ways of marginalizing such leaders and thereby limiting the scope for conflict.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, funding from whose Joseph R. Crapa Fellowship Program has made this article possible. The views expressed herein are my personal views and do not represent the views of the commission, individual commissioners or commission employees. I would also like to thank my colleagues at Forum 18, Felix Corley and John Kinahan, for their continued support.
Notes
1. Following the events in Kabardino-Balkaria described here, the interests of local business clans also became a significant factor in the development of that republic's nascent Islamist insurgency. See Tekushev (Citation2011a).
2. Listed by the US State Department as an international terrorist organization in May 2011. See Hahn (May Citation2011a).
3. In the North Caucasus, the term jamaat (Arabic: group, association) was adopted in the 1990s by groups of primarily young Muslims seeking to follow normative Islam independent from – and typically at odds with – official local Muslim boards. As will be seen in this article, the membership of such groups has proved diverse, ranging from advocates of peaceful if sometimes austere Islamic practice to militant jihadis.
4. Author's interview with Boris Pashtov, head of the Kabardino-Balkaria Committee for Youth Affairs and Social Organizations, Nalchik, 25 July 2008.
5. Contrary to appearances, usage of the epithets ‘traditional’ and ‘radical’ (or ‘Wahhabi’) in the North Caucasus depends more upon Muslims' degree of professed loyalty to the political establishment than upon their theological stance. A prominent example of this was Chechen president Akhmad Kadyrov (1951–2004). Treated as a supporter of institutionalized ‘traditional’ Islam once he transferred allegiance to the Kremlin in 1999, his Sufi beliefs had not in fact altered since his 1995 declaration of jihad against Russia as head mufti of separatist Chechnya-Ichkeria.
6. Pashtov interview.
7. Author's interview with Ali Pshigotyzhev, former local radio journalist, Nalchik, 24 July 2008.
8. Pshigotyzhev interview.
9. Author's interview with local Muslim Arsen Mokayev, Nalchik, 25 July 2008.
10. Author's interview with Mufti Anas Pshikhachev of the Kabardino-Balkaria Muslim Board, Nalchik, 25 July 2008. Mufti Pshikhachev was killed by presumed militants in December 2010.
11. Author's telephone interview with Mufti Ismail Berdiyev, chair of North Caucasus Muslim Coordinating Center, 29 October 2004.
12. Law enforcement agents in Kabardino-Balkaria appear to have identified ‘Wahhabi’ Muslims according to similar descriptions provided by the republic's official Muslim board. See Tekushev (Citation2011b, 145).
13. Author's interview with Larisa Dorogova, Muslim lawyer, Nalchik, 23 July 2008; Nal'chik Citation2005. 2005b.
14. Author's interviews with mothers of participants killed in the October 2005 uprising, Nalchik, 23 July 2008.
15. Author's interview with Mikhail Roshchin of the Institute of Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, 15 March 2011.
16. Author's interview with Lyubov Solovyeva of the Caucasus Department, Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, 22 March 2011.
17. Author's interview with Aleksei Malashenko of Carnegie Moscow Center, Moscow, 16 July 2008.
18. Author's interview with Akhmet Yarlykapov of the Caucasus Department, Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, 5 March 2011.
19. Pashtov interview.
20. Yarlykapov interview.
21. Yarlykapov interview.
22. Solovyeva interview.
23. Determined extremist by Kabardino-Balkaria courts and entered on Russia's Federal List of Extremist Materials. See Russian Justice Ministry (Citation2008, 2009).
24. Pashtov interview; Yarlykapov interview.
25. Author's interview with Imam Ibragim Shkhalakhov, Maikop, 14 April 2011.
26. The language spoken by Kabardino-Balkaria's second titular ethnicity, the Balkars, is Turkic.
27. Russians make up 61.5% of the population of Adygeya and 22.5% of the population of Kabardino-Balkaria. See Vserossiiskaia Perepis’ Naseleniia (Citation2010).
28. Author's interview with Mufti Nurbi Yemizh of Adygeya and the Krasnodar Region Muslim Board, Maikop, 11 April 2011. See also Light (Citation2012).
29. Due to the Krasnodar Region authorities' hostility towards mosque construction, many members of that region's diverse Muslim community travel to neighbouring Adygeya's mosques for Friday prayer. Author's interview with Ruslan Nadirshoyev, chair of the ‘Somonien’ Tajik cultural society, Krasnodar, 25 September 2004; author's interview with Oleg Tsvetkov of the Socio-Political Problems Department, Southern Scientific Centre, Russian Academy of Sciences, Maikop, 11 April 2011; Iarlykapov (Citation2005, 25).
30. Tekushev (Citation2011c, 156) suggests that this might be one reason for Adygeya's non-inclusion in the Kremlin's January 2010 creation of the North Caucasus Federal District.
31. The healing properties of black caraway seed were praised by the Prophet Mohammed.
32. Author's interview with anonymous Adyghe Muslim repatriate, Maikop, 12 April 2011.
33. Anonymous Adyghe Muslim repatriate interview.
34. Shkhalakhov interview.
35. Mufti Pshikhachev interview.
36. Mufti Yemizh interview.
37. Tsvetkov interview; Yarlykapov (Citation2007–2008, 14).
38. Shkhalakhov interview.
39. Shkhalakhov interview.
40. Author's interview with Said-Khasan Muskhadzhiyev, associate professor of history and law, Maikop State Technological University, Maikop, 10 April 2011; Tsvetkov interview.
41. Muskhadzhiyev interview.
42. Muskhadzhiyev interview.
43. Author's interview with Asfar Shaov, sociology lecturer, Philosophy and Sociology Department, Adygeya State University, Maikop, 13 April 2011.
44. Author's interview with Murat Berzegov, chair of Circassian Congress, Maikop, 11 April 2011.
45. Anonymous Adyghe Muslim repatriate interview; Dzeukozhev (Citation2011); Sagramoso and Yemelianova (Citation2010, 140). Sagramoso and Yemelianova add that while Tsei and Autlev preached against elaborate funeral and marriage rites, they were also critical of Salafism.
46. Author's interview with Enver Tsei, Mafekhabl, 10 April 2011.
47. Author's interview with Iskander Tsei, Mafekhabl, 10 April 2011.
48. Muskhadzhiyev interview.
49. Shaov interview.