Discourses of Demonisation: Chechens, Russians, and the Stavropol' Riots of 2007

Abstract

In the summer of 2007, the geopolitics of Russo-North Caucasian relations were once again manifest in inter-ethnic violence. During the course of six weeks of rioting between ethnic Russian (russkii) and non-ethnic Russian (rossiiskii) citizens, three students were killed (one Chechen and two Russians) and pogroms were conducted widely. This article addresses these events through a focus on the nature and politics of the riots and those involved. I argue that a range of tensions came together to form a localised geopolitics, and that this contributes to an understanding of why these events took place. Ultimately, the riots are important as an event which reveals much about the complexity of power, space, and identity in contemporary Russia.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am grateful to Klaus Dodds, Alan Ingram, Judith Pallot, John Sallnow, and three anonymous referees for offering insightful comments on an earlier draft. This article was originally presented at the RGS-IBG Postgraduate Forum Midterm Conference at the University of Plymouth in March 2009. The research for this article was supported by a CEELBAS doctoral studentship from the ESRC, and would have been impossible without the invaluable help of so many friends, contacts, and research participants in the North Caucasus.

Notes

1. The term ‘krai’ is used to refer to nine of Russia's eighty-three federal subjects. It is often translated as ‘territory’, but can also be rendered: ‘province’, ‘county’, or ‘region’. Etymologically, the word is related to the verb ‘kroit’ which means ‘to cut’. Historically, krais were vast territories located along the periphery of Russia, since the word krai also means border, ‘a place of the cut-off’.

2. These were not the only inter-ethnic riots in Stavropol'skii krai in 2007. In February, ethnic Russians and Cossacks attacked Armenians and Georgians in Novoaleksandrovskii.

3. D. Shlapentokh, ‘The Ethnic Riots in Stavropol’, Prague Watchdog: Reporting on Conflict in the North Caucasus (2007), available at <http://www.watchdog.cz/?show=000000-000004-000002-000032&lang=1>.

4. Shlapentokh, ‘The Ethnic Riots’ (note 3); and R. Isayev, ‘Interethnic Tension High in Stavropol’. Prague Watchdog: Reporting on Conflict in the North Caucasus (2007), available at <http://www.watchdog.cz/?show=000000-000008-000001-000444&lang=1>.

5. J. O'Loughlin, A. Pannin, and F. Wittmer, F., ‘Population Change and Migration in Stavropol’ Kray: The Effects of Regional Conflicts and Economic Restructuring’. Eurasian Geography and Economics 48/2 (2007) p. 250.

6. T. H. Eriksen, Ethnicity and Nationalism: Anthropological Perspectives (London: Pluto 1993).

7. N. Megoran, ‘On Researching ‘Ethnic Conflict’: Epistemology, Politics, and a Central Asian Boundary Dispute’. Europe-Asia Studies 59 (2007) pp. 253–277.

8. Eriksen (note 6) p. 161.

9. G. Toal, ‘Re-asserting the Regional: Political Geography and Geopolitics in World Thinly Known’, Political Geography 22 (2003) p. 654.

10. A. B. Murphy, and J. O'Loughlin, ‘New Horizons for Regional Geography’, Eurasian Geography and Economics 50/3 (2009) p. 245.

11. A. Bonnett, ‘Geography as the World Discipline: Connecting Popular and Academic Geographical Imaginations’. Area 35/1 (2003) p. 56.

12. See, A. Jeffrey, ‘Contesting Europe: The Politics of Bosnian Integration into European Structures’, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 26/3 (2008) pp. 428–443.

13. See, N. Megoran, ‘The Critical Geopolitics of Danger in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan’, Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 23/4 (2005) pp. 555–580.

14. Some steps towards this are visible in Gearóid Ó Tuathail and John O'Loughlin's work with Vladimir Kolossov on North Ossetia (2008), as well as O'Loughlin and Wittmer's recent work on localised geographies of violence (2009), and Ó Tuathail's own work on Beslan (2009). In 2007 a Special Issue of Eurasian Geography and Economics (vol. 48, no. 2) was devoted to ‘The Caucasus: Political, Population, and Economic Geographies’. See J. O'Loughlin, G. Ó Tuathail, and V. Kolossov, ‘The Localized Geopolitics of Displacement and Return in Eastern Prigorodnyy Rayon, North Ossetia’, Eurasian Geography and Economics 50/6 (2008) pp. 635–669; and G. Ó Tuathail, ‘Placing Blame: Making Sense of Beslan’, Political Geography 28/1 (2009) pp. 4–15.

15. M. Bassin, ‘The Emergence of Ethno-Geopolitics in Post-Soviet Russia’, Eurasian Geography and Economics 50/2 (2009) p. 131.

16. Toal (note 9) p. 654.

17. The influential Russian Human Rights group ‘Za Prava Cheloveka’ [‘For Human Rights’] issued a report which diverged significantly with the ‘official’ version of events. They reported that Ataev had not been killed in a brawl with ethnic Russians, but had been beaten to death by the police. Quoting Ataev's uncle, a statement on their website said that Ataev's wrists bore signs of having been handcuffed and that he had other injuries which indicated he had been beaten with a blunt object. The statement, which was accompanied by a photograph of the injuries, said police officers at the brawl had dragged the victim into a police car while he was still alive. Available at <http://www.zaprava.ru/content/view/912/2/>.

18. G. Kozhevnikova, ‘Radical Nationalism in Russia, and Efforts to Counteract It in 2007’, Sova Centre for Information and Analysis (2008), available at <http://xeno.sova-center.ru/6BA2468/ 6BB4208/AC15D1E#_ftn29>.

19. K. O'Flynn, ‘Stavropol’ on Alert for Ethnic Clashes’, The Moscow Times, 5 June 2007, p. 3.

20. Given the tendency for Chechens to follow traditional means of avenging death – ‘Chechen Blood Feud’ – it is not entirely out of the question that Ataev's family launched a vendetta.

21. Alexei Petrovish Yermolov (1777–1861) was commander of the Tsarist forces in the North Caucasus in the early nineteenth century where his name became a byword for brutality. He once remarked that “I desire that the terror of my name should guard our frontiers with more potential than chains or fortresses, that my word should be for the natives a law more inevitable than death” (Russell 2007: 31). Yermolov's view of the Chechens was particularly dismissive. He thought of them as the “basest of the bandits who attack the (Caucasian) Line… Chechnya might rightly be called the nest of all bandits” (Gammer 2006: 35) and, in 1818, wrote to Tsar Alexander I that he “would find no peace whilst a single Chechen remained alive” (Bennigsen 1999: 536). He is a source of pride for Russian nationalists, and a figure of hatred for Chechens. See J. Russell, Chechnya – Russia's ‘War On Terror’ (London: Routledge 2007); M. Gammer, The Lone Wolf and the Bear: Three Centuries of Russian Defiance of Russian Rule (London: Hurst 2006); and M. Bennigsen, ‘Chechnia: Political Developments and Strategic Implications for the North Caucasus’, Central Asian Survey 18/4 (1999) pp. 535–574.

22. Russians often refer to Chechens and other inhabitants of the North Caucasus as cherniye (blacks) and chernozhopy (black arses), despite the fact that Caucasians, being Caucasian, are largely white-skinned. For an overview of racial discourse in Russian nationalism, see Amnesty International, Russian Federation: Violent Racism Out of Control (2006), available at <http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/EUR46/022/2006>; and R. Kachaturian, ‘The Spectre of Russian Nationalism’, Dissent 56/1 (2009) pp. 19–24.

23. A ‘raion’ (or ‘rayon’) is an administrative division of a federal subject or of a city. It is most often translated as a ‘district’.

24. Kommersant, ‘Stavropol’, Ulishali Stolitse’ [Stavropol’ Heard in the Capital] (2007), available at <http://www.kommersant.ru/doc.aspx?DocsID=772252>.

25. Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, ‘Ethnic Tensions Mounting in Restive Stavropol’ (2007), available at <http://www.rferl.org/content/article/1076993.html>.

26. Chernogorov was removed from office a year later, in 2008, after ‘A Just Russia’ (Spravedlivaya Rossiya) defeated ‘United Russia’ (Edinaya Rossiya) in a vote for the regional legislature. Chernogorov was subsequently ousted from ‘United Russia’ by State Duma speaker, and (then) United Russia leader, Boris Gryzlov.

27. O. A. Mel'nik, ‘Mezhethnicheskii konflikt kak proyayablenie obshchestvennoi intolerantnosti (na primere sob'itiye v g. Stavropole v Mae 2007 g.)’ [Inter-Ethnic Conflict as an Example of Social Intolerance (The Example of the Events in Stavropol City in May 2007)], Mezhetnicheskie i etnokonffessional'nie otnosheniya na yugo Rossii: Istoriya, covremennost', perspektib' [Interethnic and Ethno-Confessional Relations in South Russia: History, Contemporary, Perspectives] (Pyatigorsk: Severo-Kavkazskay Akademiya gosydarstvennoi slyzhbi 2008) pp. 287–291.

28. Kommersant (note 24).

29. Just as during the Beslan hostage siege. See Ó Tuathail (note 14).

30. ‘Na Grani Paniki’ [On the Verge of Panic], Stavropol'skaya Pravda, 5 June 2007, available at <http://www.stapravda.ru/20070605/Na_grani_paniki_5532.html>.

31. There is reason to believe that Alexander Chernogorov sympathised with the ultra-nationalists. During an investigation into allegations of official misconduct, he was found to have kept Nazi paraphernalia in his office. Further, such an alignment between ultra-nationalists and city authorities is nothing new in Stavropol'. In the 1990s, the ‘Russian National Unity’ (now disbanded) found official support from the Stavropol'skii krai regional administration. Members of the group ‘patrolled’ public parks and city streets, gradually becoming an arm of the regional government. However, in 1998, Moscow's mayor, Yuri Luzhkov, a nationalist sympathiser himself, forbade a planned Russian National Unity gathering, as part of a larger federal anti-Russian National Unity campaign. The influence of the group began to wane after that, and two years later it split into a number of smaller factions, which are still active today.

32. V. V. Putin, ‘Interv'yu frantsyzckomy ezhenedel'niky ‘Pari-Match’' [Interview with the French Weekly Paris-Match], available at <http://www.kremlin.ru/appears/2000/07/06/0000_type63379_125007.shtml>.

33. Kozhevnikova, ‘Radical Nationalism 2007’ (note 18).

34. RFE/RL, ‘Russia: Clashes in Karelia Underscore Mounting Ethnic Pressure’, Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, 4 Sep. 2006, available at <http://www.rferl.org/content/article/1071075.html>.

35. Putin, ‘Interv'yu (note 32).

36. V. V. Putin, ‘Televizionnoe obrashenie k grazhdannam Rossii’ [Television Address to the Citizens of Russia] (2000), available at <http://www.kremlin.ru/appears/2000/03/24/0000_type63374type82634_125294.shtml>.

37. For an overview of the contested meaning of the phrase, see R. Camus, ‘We'll Whack Them, Even in the Outhouse’: On a Phrase by V. V. Putin', Kultura 10 (2006) pp. 3–8.

38. Ó Tuathail (note 14).

39. Ibid.

40. This heading is taken from the title of a report written by Oleg Tsvetkov and published in the Russian Analytical Digest. See O. Tsvetkov, ‘Ethnic Russians Flee the North Caucasus’, Russian Analytical Digest 7/3 (Oct. 2006), available at <http://www.res.ethz.ch/analysis/rad/details.cfm?lng=en&id=24150>.

41. For an example of a pro-Russian hostile ethnic policy in the North Caucasus, see A. Popov and I. Kuznetsov, ‘Ethnic Discrimination and the Discourse of “Indigenization”: The Regional Regime, “Indigenous Majority” and Ethnic Minorities in Krasnodar Krai in Russia’, Nationalities Papers 36/2 (2008) pp. 223–252.

42. At the height of the Second Chechen War in early 2000, Human Rights Watch reported that over 300,000 people had been forced out of their homes. After the war, authorities put heavy pressure on the displaced to go home, and in 2004 Russian authorities closed camps in the neighbouring republic of Ingushetia that housed the majority of refugees. The head of Norwegian Refugee Council's Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre said in early 2007 that authorities throughout Russia were still pushing displaced Chechens to go back to Chechnya. According to UNHCR, there were still more than 50,000 displaced Chechens living in private accommodation in early 2008, as well as almost 6,000 still in temporary homes. The Danish Refugee Council said almost 13,000 displaced Chechens were still in Ingushetia and the Russian non-governmental organisation VESTA registered about 4,000 remaining in Dagestan. See <http://www.alertnet.org/db/crisisprofiles/RU_WAR.htm?v=in_detail>.

43. V. S. Belozerov, Etnicheskaya karta Serverogo Kavkaza [Ethnic Map of the North Caucasus] (Moscow: OGI 2005).

44. Putin, V. V. quoted on www.konflikt.ru, 25 May 2005.

45. V. V. Zhirinovsky, ‘Stenogramma lektsiy V. V. Zhirinovskogo v MGOU’ [Transcript of Lectures of V. V. Zhirinovskiy at MGOU] (2006), available at <http://www.ldpr.ru/leader/325/473/>.

46. This phrase is significant because Russians refer to the Post-Soviet states as the blizhneye zarubezhye. Although this phrase is difficult to translate into English, it is usually rendered as the ‘near abroad’: ‘Blizhneye’ is the neuter of ‘blizhniy’, an adjective meaning ‘near’, while ‘zarubezhye’ (a noun with no English equivalent) is constructed from ‘rubezh’ (‘border’) and the prefix ‘za’ (‘beyond’). The phrase originally had an ironic nuance, used by people during the Soviet-era to describe ‘the present-day abroad’ (nastoyashchyeye za rubezhye). However the words have now acquired a politico-geographical meaning in order to distinguish the states of the C.I.S. (Commonwealth of Independent States – a title now rarely used) from Russia's ‘original’ abroad. Rightly or wrongly, Russia's political elite have difficulty viewing the republics on its periphery as fully sovereign entities; the use of the term ‘near abroad’, in addition to qualifying their independence, signifies to the ‘far abroad’ (dalniye zarubezhye) that Russia claims certain rights in the region that transcend traditional diplomatic conventions.

47. S. Markedonov, <Na stike mirov. Stavropol'skii krai: Fornost russkikh ili zone zona integratsii?' [‘On a Border of the Worlds. Stavropol Territory: An Advanced Post of Russia or a Zone of Integration?’] (2009), available at <http://www.chaskor.ru/p.php?id=7827>.

48. Ibid.

49. See A. Matveeva, The North Caucasus: Russia's Fragile Borderland (London: The Royal Institute of International Affairs 1999) p. 42.

50. See O. I. Vendina, V. S. Belozerov, and A. Gustafson, ‘The Wars in Chechnya and Their Effects on Neighboring Regions’, Eurasian Geography and Economics 48/2 (2007) pp. 178–201.

51. V. A. Kolossov, T. A. Galkina, and A. D. Krindatch, ‘Territorial'naya identichnost’ i mezhetnicheskiye otnosheniya (Na primere vostochnykh rayonov Stavropol'skogo kraya)' [Territorial Identity and Inter-ethnic Relations (The Case of Eastern Rayons of Stavropol' Krai)], Polis (Political Studies) 11/2 (2001) pp. 61–78.

52. Belozerov (note 43); and V. S. Belozerov, V. S. Tikunov, and A. Panin, ‘Atlas Informational System for the Investigation of Ethnodemographic Processes in the Stavropol Krai’, Vestnik Moskovskogo Universiteta, Seriya 5: Geografiya 1 (2008) pp. 39–44.

53. It was only on 25 June 2002 that Putin declared that not all Chechens are terrorists, admitting that “our task is to destroy this imagine [of Chechens] as terrorists”. Available at <www.rferl.org/newsline/2002/06/1-RUS/rus-250602.asp>.

54. Like many acts of ‘terrorism’ in Russia, the precise details of what exactly happened are not known. Indeed, certain aspects of the train bombing are unclear and are not likely to ever be free of contention. I have pieced together this ‘version’ of events from numerous (often conflicting) newspaper reports.

55. V. V. Putin, ‘Zayavlenie ha vstreche s direktom federal'noi sluzhbi besopasnosti Nikolaem Patrushevim i Generalnim prokurrorom Vladimirom Ustinovim v sbyazi s terrioristicheskim aktom v elektropoezde Kislovodsk-Minvodi’ [Statement at Meeting with Director of the Federal Security Service Nikolai Patrushev and Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov on the Terrorist Act in the Kislovodsk-Mineralniye Vody Train] (2003), available at <http://www.kremlin.ru/appears/2003/12/05/1523_type63374type63378type82634_56717.shtml>.

56. D. Shlapentokh, ‘The War in Chechnya and the Russian Public’, Prague Watchdog: Reporting conflict in the North Caucasus (2006), available at <http://www.watchdog.cz/?show=000000-000004-000002-000027&lang=1>.

57. This story is very similar to one told by Dmitri Shlapentokh. See Shlapentokh (ibid.).

58. S. Markedonov, ‘Stavropol'e: Plavil'niya kotel ili oboronitel'niye val?’ [Stavropol': Melting Pot or Boiling Shaft?] (2008), available at <http://www.politcom.ru/4293.html>.

59. See A. Tsutsiev, Atlas etnopoliticheskoy istorii kavkaza 1774–2004 [Atlas of Ethno-Political History of the Caucasus, 1774–2004] (Moscow: Evropa 2005).

60. Kliment Voroshilov (1881–1969) was Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR (1925–1934) and a full member of the Politburo (1926–1960). He was also People's Commissar for Defence (appointed in 1934), a Marshal of the Soviet Union (appointed in 1935), and oversaw the establishment of the communist regime in Hungary (1945–1947). Voroshilov played a central role in the Great Purge of the 1930s, denouncing many of his own military colleagues and subordinates and, when Stalin died (in March 1953) was appointed Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet.

61. The word ‘okrug’ can be translated as ‘area’, ‘district’, or ‘region’. In meaning, the word is similar to the German term ‘bezirk’ (‘district’) which refers to something ‘encircled’ or ‘surrounded’.

62. J. O'Loughlin, V. Kolossov, and J. Radvanyi, ‘The Caucasus in a Time of Conflict, Demographic Transition, and Economic Change’, Eurasian Geography and Economics 48/2 (2007) p. 141.

63. See S. Wolff, Ethnic Conflict: A Global Perspective (New York: Oxford University Press 2007).

64. See D. Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict (Berkeley: University of California Press 2000).

65. Amnesty International, ‘Russian Federation: Out of Control: Anti-Chechen Sentiment in Moscow post-Metro Blast’ (2004), available at <http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/EUR46/007/2004/en/6f3db1c2-fabd-11dd-b6c4-73b1aa157d32/eur460072004en.pdf>.

66. E. Chebankova, ‘Implications of Putin's Regional and Demographic Policies on the Evolution of Inter-Ethnic Relations in Russia’, Perspectives on European Politics and Society 8/4 (2007) pp. 439–459.

67. Amnesty International, Amnesty International Report 2008: The Russian Federation (2008), available at <http://thereport.amnesty.org/eng/regions/europe-and-central-asia/russian-federation>.

68. G. Kozhevnikova, ‘Radical Nationalism in Russia, and Efforts to Counteract It in 2008’, Sova Centre for Information and Analysis (2009), available at <http://xeno.sova-center.ru/6BA2468/6BB4208/CCD6D21>.