Paul Goble
Staunton, September 29 – Uzbekistan President Islam Karimov and his government are confusing the high level of religiosity among Muslims in their country with Islamist extremism, according to a group of independent analysts, and as a result, they are fighting the former and unintentionally fostering the latter even as they discredit the idea of a secular state.
The Expert Working Group of Uzbekistan, an independent group of Uzbek intellectuals there and abroad, draws that conclusion in a detailed 7,000-word study released this week about the state of Islam in Uzbekistan and the complicated relationship between Muslims and the Uzbekistan government (news.ferghana.ru/archive/2010/politikaislama.doc).
Prepared by Kamoliddin Rabbimov, an Uzbek specialist who worked at the USA Institute in Tashkent 2003-2005) but who now lives in exile in France, the report argues that Uzbekistan is a place where given “the decline of other value systems such as liberal democracy and national independence, Islam has preserved its position” in the mass consciousness of Uzbeks.
And while it is “incorrect to consider Islam in Uzbekistan as an opponent of the secular and liberal path of development of the country” – “Islam [there] still does not have its own political program” – “in the post-Karimov epoch, the social-political status of Islam will be reconsidered” over the course of time.
Surveys conducted over the last 15 years show, the report continues, that far more people in Uzbekistan consider themselves Muslims first rather than Uzbeks first and that if one adds to the former the number who say that the two cannot be divided, there are now more than four times as many whose primary identity is Islamic rather than secular.
Given the centrality of Islam for most Uzbeks, the Karimov regime has “not fought with Islam as such.” Instead, Tashkent today “has set itself a task of a different character, namely to lower the level of the religiosity of society and hold it at a level that is comfortable for the powers that be.”
“The current leaders of Uzbekistan see in Islam,” the report says, “a generator of protest attitudes among the population. That is, they view it as ‘a source of instability and a system that forms threats” to themselves. Thus, “the government sets as its task to control as much as possible all processes connected with Islam.”
That represents “a strategic mistake” on the part of the Uzbek leaders, who have “decided to struggle with the level of religiosity” of the population when in fact it is “necessary to struggle with the character of the religiosity of the population,” something which is by its very nature is “enormously” different.
“When one speaks about ‘the character of religiosity,’” the report says, “one has in mind the situation when Muslims begin to use Islam as ‘an ideology of resistance’ against those whom they consider their opponents or with whom they do not agree.” Such people may in fact – indeed, typically are – less religious than those who do not do that.
“In other words,” the report goes one, “the powers that be must clearly distinguish the high level of religiosity [among Uzbeks as a population] from religiously motivated extremism and the terrorism connected with it and not in any case combine them into a single thing and str4uggle against them with equal pitilessness.”
Unfortunately, that is exactly what Tashkent has done, something that has led most observers to conclude one of two things. On the one hand, some argue that what Tashkent is doing is a proper struggle against religious extremism. And on the other hand, others suggest that the Uzbek powers that be are fighting the wrong battle.
In the view of the latter, the regime should be fighting those who make use of Islamist slogans rather than those who are committed to Islam. The report positions itself closer to the latter, arguing that while attachment to Islamic ideas is great in Uzbekistan, Islamism and Jihadism “have not had and do not have” serious influence there.
But the powers that be in Tashkent “think that between religious extremism and a high level of religiosity is a direct interdependence” when in fact the relationship between the two is more complicated and can be reduced to what the Uzbek government believes only if the Uzbek government continues to act as it does.
If the Uzbek government accepted the principles of religious freedom, then it could understand the nature of Islamic criticisms of public policy, something that is very much part of Islamic life but that in and of itself is not a threat to the regime unless the powers that be unintentionally makes it one.
The report gives the following example of this relationship: Uzbek “society uses alcohol and the government is interested in its sale. If the mosques want to criticize the use of alcoholic beverages, they understand that they may clash with the interests of the state. But if they make peace with the situation, then, according to Islamic law, they are committing a serious sin.”
Still worse, the Muslim leaders recognize that they will “lose legitimacy in the eyes of believers who have a high level of religiosity,” something that can “lead to the growth in the popularity of alternative religious organizations and groups” if the state forces “official” mullahs and imams to toe the state’s line.
Indeed, the report suggests, the construction of a system of Muslim leaders who always go along with the state will not establish control over religious Muslims but rather ensure that the government will lose control over precisely that part of the population, one very large in Uzbekistan, and that at least some of those believers will turn elsewhere for leadership.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Window on Eurasia: Moscow’s Introduction of Chechnya-Style Force Structures in Daghestan Worries Many There and Elsewhere
Paul Goble
Staunton, September 29 – As violence in Daghestan mounts and the death toll in that North Caucasus republic mounts, Moscow’s decision to create new military units in that North Caucasus republic made up primarily of members of local nationalities, a system that resembles the one Ramzan Kadyrov has in Chechnya, is proving to be increasingly controversial.
Two days ago, Vasily Panchenkov, press spokesman for the internal troops of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs, announced that a special battalion was being formed in Daghestan whose personnel, both draftees and professionals, are drawn primarily from the nationalities of that republic (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru/articles/174871/).
The spokesman added that “the decision on the creation of [this] military unit” which has been discussed in the Moscow and Makhachkala media over the last month, “was taken by Russian Federation President [Dmitry] Medvedev who was reacting to a request by Daghestan President Magomedsalam Magomedov.”
But despite such backing from the highest levels, the creation of this new 750-man unit has not been universally popular. Islamagomed Nabiyev, the head of the independent drivers and entrepreneurs union of Daghestan, said that the new unit could easily be misused and duplicates existing institutions.
“On the one hand,” he told Kavkaz-uzel.ru, most senior officials in various parts of Daghestan already have “their own guard force which not infrequently solves the problems of the boss.” This new unit, he suggests, simply extends that pattern upward, giving the republic president his own political hit squad with all the problems that entails.
And on the other, Nabiyev continued, there is a very real question as to why it is necessary to create “such special units when there is the militia, the FSB and the Army. The example of Chechnya already shows that such structures become cruel and pitiless attack squads,” and one provision of the Daghestani unit makes that even more likely.
According to his information, the trade union leader said, the interior ministry plans to recruit “relatives of those who have suffered from the actions of the militants.” Given the mentality of the people there, he continued, “such people in their work will be led not by the laws of Russia but by the laws of the mountains regarding blood feuds.”
Denga Khalidov, vice president of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems of Russia and the head of the Center for Strategic and Ethno-Political Research, agrees. “I do not know who took this decision,” he said. But in his view, there are already enough units and, if not, new ones should be created only within existing structures, not according to new rules.
But the plan has its supporters, especially among those close to the top leaders in Makhachkala. Zubayru Zubayruev, a press spokesman for the Daghestani president, says he does not see any “violation of the law in the formation of the special division.” The state, he continued, “must defend itself from those who want to overthrow the existing order by force.”
To do that it needs people who know the lay of the land. At present, Russian “people in the force structures do not know the local areas, do not have contacts with the population and so on,” whereas those from the local population who will be in this special unit know the area and are part of the people they are protecting.
And in this, the presidential press spokesman continued, there is nothing wrong “with having relatives of those who have suffered from the arbitrariness of the militants,” given that “nowhere is it written that one must ignore such people” in forming units to fight those in the forests.
But Vyacheslav Gasanov, a spokesman for the Daghestani Ministry of Internal Affairs, while supporting the idea, had a slightly different view. He said that members of the unit will be recruited “on a voluntary basis as professionals.” And therefore, it will be essential to exclude any possibility of such people acting on the basis of blood feud principles.
According to Kavkaz-Uzel.ru, the unit once it is fully formed will be a motorized battalion and will be dressed in the uniforms of the interior ministry. Its 700 to 750 members will be based near the Daghestani capital of Makhachkala but will be deployed as needed throughout the republic.
Staunton, September 29 – As violence in Daghestan mounts and the death toll in that North Caucasus republic mounts, Moscow’s decision to create new military units in that North Caucasus republic made up primarily of members of local nationalities, a system that resembles the one Ramzan Kadyrov has in Chechnya, is proving to be increasingly controversial.
Two days ago, Vasily Panchenkov, press spokesman for the internal troops of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs, announced that a special battalion was being formed in Daghestan whose personnel, both draftees and professionals, are drawn primarily from the nationalities of that republic (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru/articles/174871/).
The spokesman added that “the decision on the creation of [this] military unit” which has been discussed in the Moscow and Makhachkala media over the last month, “was taken by Russian Federation President [Dmitry] Medvedev who was reacting to a request by Daghestan President Magomedsalam Magomedov.”
But despite such backing from the highest levels, the creation of this new 750-man unit has not been universally popular. Islamagomed Nabiyev, the head of the independent drivers and entrepreneurs union of Daghestan, said that the new unit could easily be misused and duplicates existing institutions.
“On the one hand,” he told Kavkaz-uzel.ru, most senior officials in various parts of Daghestan already have “their own guard force which not infrequently solves the problems of the boss.” This new unit, he suggests, simply extends that pattern upward, giving the republic president his own political hit squad with all the problems that entails.
And on the other, Nabiyev continued, there is a very real question as to why it is necessary to create “such special units when there is the militia, the FSB and the Army. The example of Chechnya already shows that such structures become cruel and pitiless attack squads,” and one provision of the Daghestani unit makes that even more likely.
According to his information, the trade union leader said, the interior ministry plans to recruit “relatives of those who have suffered from the actions of the militants.” Given the mentality of the people there, he continued, “such people in their work will be led not by the laws of Russia but by the laws of the mountains regarding blood feuds.”
Denga Khalidov, vice president of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems of Russia and the head of the Center for Strategic and Ethno-Political Research, agrees. “I do not know who took this decision,” he said. But in his view, there are already enough units and, if not, new ones should be created only within existing structures, not according to new rules.
But the plan has its supporters, especially among those close to the top leaders in Makhachkala. Zubayru Zubayruev, a press spokesman for the Daghestani president, says he does not see any “violation of the law in the formation of the special division.” The state, he continued, “must defend itself from those who want to overthrow the existing order by force.”
To do that it needs people who know the lay of the land. At present, Russian “people in the force structures do not know the local areas, do not have contacts with the population and so on,” whereas those from the local population who will be in this special unit know the area and are part of the people they are protecting.
And in this, the presidential press spokesman continued, there is nothing wrong “with having relatives of those who have suffered from the arbitrariness of the militants,” given that “nowhere is it written that one must ignore such people” in forming units to fight those in the forests.
But Vyacheslav Gasanov, a spokesman for the Daghestani Ministry of Internal Affairs, while supporting the idea, had a slightly different view. He said that members of the unit will be recruited “on a voluntary basis as professionals.” And therefore, it will be essential to exclude any possibility of such people acting on the basis of blood feud principles.
According to Kavkaz-Uzel.ru, the unit once it is fully formed will be a motorized battalion and will be dressed in the uniforms of the interior ministry. Its 700 to 750 members will be based near the Daghestani capital of Makhachkala but will be deployed as needed throughout the republic.
Window on Eurasia: Kazan Seeks to Use Teachers from Across Russia to Boost Tatar Numbers in Upcoming Census
Paul Goble
Staunton, September 29 – Fearful Moscow will succeed in reducing their numbers either by counting as separate nationalities many of the 120 variants of “Tatar” on the list the Russian authorities have approved, the Tatarstan government is appealing to teachers of Tatars across the Russian Federation to urge students and their parents to declare themselves Tatars.
The Tatars, the second largest nationality in the country according to all recent censuses, face particular difficulties in this regard because a majority of the members of their nationality live outside Tatarstan and many of them are inclined to identify themselves other than Kazan Tatars, something that reduces the power and influence of Tatarstan.
That reality, Yan Gordeyev, the Tatarstan correspondent of Moscow’s “Nezavisimaya gazeta,” says, lies behind what happened yesterday at the Fifth Congress of Tatar Pedagogues,” a session where he suggests the most important developments had little to do with the theme of education (www.ng.ru/columnist/2010-09-29/6_tatary.html).
The most important speeches at the meeting of some 500 teachers from those regions “where there are Tatar diasporas – and this is about half of the subjects of the [Russian] Federation” -- were delivered by Zil Valeyev, Tatarstan’s first vice prime minister, and its parliamentary speaker Farid Mukhametshin, who oversees “the nationality question” there.
Gordeyev noted that the teachers, after first meeting in sections, assembled in Kazan’s Kamal Theater, “the traditional place where the government of the republic holds congresses and forums one way or another devoted to the nationality question.” By shifting the meeting there, the Kazan authorities were underscoring the messages of Valeyev and Mukhametshin.
As their speeches showed, “the government of Tatarstan is seriously concerned with the problem of the artificial split of the Tatar people, something which could be reflected in the upcoming census of the Russian Federation,” given the “liberal” approach Moscow has adopted to national identity.
In earlier censuses, and especially in 2002, the Tatars were concerned by Moscow’s open campaign to reduce the number of their nation by playing up the distinctiveness of the Kryashens, people who Russian experts sometimes suggest are a separate nationality but who the Tatars believe are simply Orthodox Christian Tatars.
This time around, however, Kazan faces a different challenge. Rosstat has come up with a list of 120 different identities people who Kazan would view as Tatars may declare. In the view of many specialists in Kazan and some elsewhere, this arrangement while ostensibly neutral “threatens” to seriously reduce the number of people listed as Tatars in the census returns.
In recent weeks, Tatarstan officials have called upon “all Tatars to describe themselves only as Tatars and in no other way, thereby preserving their identity and strengthening their unity. Until about a month ago, this campaign was focused on the Tatars of Tatarstan, but now Kazan is looking beyond that republic’s borders.
Last month, it convened an all-Russian Congress of Tatar Youth and an all-Russian Congress of Religious Leaders. At both, Gordeyev says, the leaders of Tatarstan delivered the message that the members of those groups should try to convince all Tatars to declare themselves as such.
Now, Gordeyev says, Kazan is delivering “this simple but important thought” to teachers – and for what he suggests is a very good reason. “In many regions of Russia, the teacher of one’s native language is also ‘a national activist’ and has a great deal of authority among members of his or her community.”
Consequently, the “Nezavisimaya gazeta” journalist says, “the government of Tatarstan is now making use of the activity and authority of these teachers for the solution of pressing political tasks,” just one of the ways in which political, ethnic and regional leaders are behaving in the run-up to the October census.
Staunton, September 29 – Fearful Moscow will succeed in reducing their numbers either by counting as separate nationalities many of the 120 variants of “Tatar” on the list the Russian authorities have approved, the Tatarstan government is appealing to teachers of Tatars across the Russian Federation to urge students and their parents to declare themselves Tatars.
The Tatars, the second largest nationality in the country according to all recent censuses, face particular difficulties in this regard because a majority of the members of their nationality live outside Tatarstan and many of them are inclined to identify themselves other than Kazan Tatars, something that reduces the power and influence of Tatarstan.
That reality, Yan Gordeyev, the Tatarstan correspondent of Moscow’s “Nezavisimaya gazeta,” says, lies behind what happened yesterday at the Fifth Congress of Tatar Pedagogues,” a session where he suggests the most important developments had little to do with the theme of education (www.ng.ru/columnist/2010-09-29/6_tatary.html).
The most important speeches at the meeting of some 500 teachers from those regions “where there are Tatar diasporas – and this is about half of the subjects of the [Russian] Federation” -- were delivered by Zil Valeyev, Tatarstan’s first vice prime minister, and its parliamentary speaker Farid Mukhametshin, who oversees “the nationality question” there.
Gordeyev noted that the teachers, after first meeting in sections, assembled in Kazan’s Kamal Theater, “the traditional place where the government of the republic holds congresses and forums one way or another devoted to the nationality question.” By shifting the meeting there, the Kazan authorities were underscoring the messages of Valeyev and Mukhametshin.
As their speeches showed, “the government of Tatarstan is seriously concerned with the problem of the artificial split of the Tatar people, something which could be reflected in the upcoming census of the Russian Federation,” given the “liberal” approach Moscow has adopted to national identity.
In earlier censuses, and especially in 2002, the Tatars were concerned by Moscow’s open campaign to reduce the number of their nation by playing up the distinctiveness of the Kryashens, people who Russian experts sometimes suggest are a separate nationality but who the Tatars believe are simply Orthodox Christian Tatars.
This time around, however, Kazan faces a different challenge. Rosstat has come up with a list of 120 different identities people who Kazan would view as Tatars may declare. In the view of many specialists in Kazan and some elsewhere, this arrangement while ostensibly neutral “threatens” to seriously reduce the number of people listed as Tatars in the census returns.
In recent weeks, Tatarstan officials have called upon “all Tatars to describe themselves only as Tatars and in no other way, thereby preserving their identity and strengthening their unity. Until about a month ago, this campaign was focused on the Tatars of Tatarstan, but now Kazan is looking beyond that republic’s borders.
Last month, it convened an all-Russian Congress of Tatar Youth and an all-Russian Congress of Religious Leaders. At both, Gordeyev says, the leaders of Tatarstan delivered the message that the members of those groups should try to convince all Tatars to declare themselves as such.
Now, Gordeyev says, Kazan is delivering “this simple but important thought” to teachers – and for what he suggests is a very good reason. “In many regions of Russia, the teacher of one’s native language is also ‘a national activist’ and has a great deal of authority among members of his or her community.”
Consequently, the “Nezavisimaya gazeta” journalist says, “the government of Tatarstan is now making use of the activity and authority of these teachers for the solution of pressing political tasks,” just one of the ways in which political, ethnic and regional leaders are behaving in the run-up to the October census.
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