Paul Goble
Staunton, October 27 – The draft FSB decree implementing the July 2010 law that requires the special services to warn those whose words or actions suggest they may commit a crime includes provisions that put all Russian citizens be at and that sets the country on the road to “the good old times” of the Soviet past, according to a Moscow journalist.
In an article in today’s “Nezavisimaya gazeta” entitled “The FSB Warns: The Good Old Times are Returning,” Ivan Rodin argues that the newly published draft decree will “lead to the strengthening of control [by the FSB and other organs] over practically all citizens of the country” (www.ng.ru/politics/2010-10-27/3_fsb.html).
When the law on which the FSB draft decree is based was debated, Rodin recalls, there was “a serious discussion in society which reached up to the president.” But with the publication of the draft decree (www.fsb.ru/fsb/npd/prna/single.htm!id%3D10435799%40fsbNpa.html), it is “becoming clear how this prophylactic mechanism will work.”
But as is often the case with such measures, it is what is left uncertain that not only prompts questions but raises concerns about the way in which the powers that be will use this new mechanism of social control, a mechanism that could rapidly assume truly frightening dimensions.
One question left unresolved, the “Nezavisimaya gazeta” journalist continues, has to do with what representatives of government institutions or social groups can be called “to the ceremony of giving a citizen an official warning” that his or her actions point toward the possible commission of a crime.
Another has to do with how a citizen who has been warned is going to be required to react. During discussions of the draft bill last summer, its supporters called it a “prophylactic” measure, saying that it would allow FSB officers to warn citizens that their declarations or actions were approaching a “dangerous” point at which a crime might be committed.
On the one hand, any citizen who receives such a warning is obligated to act accordingly. But on the other, “for those who ignore [such warning], no punishments are specified,” an “illogical” situation which was discussed in the Duma but which has not been resolved in the draft decree just published.
The only guidance the draft decree does provide on this point, Rodin says, is contained in one of the attachments. There it is “again said that ignoring a warning simply will lead the individual to the commission of a crime and that he will be punished for that,” a notion that “Russians as always will have to understand on the basis of their own experience.”
Another question that the draft decree leaves unresolved, the journalist continues, is whether the text of the official warning can be published in the media “even without the agreement of the individual who has been warned.” Such steps were allowed in the first draft of the bill but were dropped in the course of negotiations.
But “what do we see in the draft” decree? Rodin asks. Once again, the powers that be claim the right to publish such warnings and thereby mobilize public opinion against individuals who have been warned. That opens the way to the kind of state-sponsored social pressure that likely will be directed at anyone the powers that be do not approve of.
Yet another provision of the draft FSB measure is disturbing. It calls on FSB officers to carefully document the reasons for their warnings. That suggests that the FSB will now be collecting even more information on more categories of citizens and that the organs will have to detain those they are warning for a certain amount of time.
Just who will fall into “the risk groups”? Rodin asks rhetorically, arguing that “practically everyone without exception” because the organs will seek to forestall “not only those crimes which the criminal code lists” but also those which the law enforcement agencies may be the first to know about.
It is quite clear, Rodin concludes, that “as soon as the FSB makes its permitted prophylactic system operational, information about the one and about the other bad intentions circulation it the heads of our citizens will flow to the chekists like a broad river.” And that in turn will require the FSB to get bigger and bigger, with all the obvious negative consequences.
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Window on Eurasia: Tatarstan Mosques Directed to Use Tatar Rather than Russian
Paul Goble
Staunton, October 27 – Mosques in Tatarstan and quite possibly Tatar mosques elsewhere in the Russian Federation, so called because they were established by Tatars and served that community first, will resume using Tatar as the primary language for services, a shift that has divided both the Muslim community and the secular authorities in that country.
Muslims are divided on this point, with some insisting that Islam by its nature is supranational and that Russian both provides a more widely understood lingua franca and helps promote Islamic unity within Russia, and others arguing that there is no good reason to give preference to Russian as opposed to other languages.
And Russian officials are split as well, with most seeing the use of Russian helping to integrate Muslims into the broader society but some arguing that it has the effect of promoting a common Muslim identity against national ones and noting that in Russia today, Wahhabism and other forms of Islamist extremism, is typically a Russian language phenomenon.
The issue came to a head at an October 11th meeting of the Ulema Council of the Muslim Spiritual Directorate (MSD) of Tatarstan, a session that has now been written by Irek Mukhametzyanov, a Tatar Muslim journalist, for the Islam-portal.ru site on the Russian Internet (www.islam-portal.ru/novosti/104/1166/).
Of the many decisions the meeting took, the one that sparked the most controversy concerned a recommendation that “the mosques of the Republic of Tatarstan conduct services in Tatar.” At the same time, “with the permission of the mufti,” mullahs and imams could continue to employ Russian as a supplement to Tatar.
As Mukhametzyanov points out, the decision generated “both a positive and also a negative reaction among the Muslims of Tatarstan and of Russia. Shavkat Avyasov, the head of the Russian Islamic Heritage group and himself a Tatar resident in Moscow, was sharply opposed.
Among other things, he said, “such a decision denigrates our brother Muslims who belong to other nations and do not know Tatar.” He even suggested that standing behind this decision of the ulema were “Tatar nationalist circles” and that it reflected an increasing tendency among Tatars to speak more about “national problems” than about religion.
Rustam Batrov, the chairman of the Ulema Council of Tatarstan, defended the decision to change languages in the mosques. He suggested that Avyasov was “tilting at windmills” and ignoring the provision of the recommendation that allowed for the use of the Russian language as a supplement when necessary.
Batrov also expressed surprise that Avyasov was ignoring the reality that many Tatars, especially the elderly, understand Tatar far better than they do Russian and that their ability to participate in the mosque is reduced if the mullahs use Russian rather than their own national language.
However that may be, Mukhametzyanov continues, the issue now is bigger than that argument may suggest. “The very decision of the Ulema Council of Tatarstan is already an occasion to speak about one of the most important questions for the Tatarstan umma, the language used in the mosques.”
“For many centuries,” the Muslim journalist says, “the language [of the mosques of Tatarstan] was Tatar (old Tatar, Volga Turkic) and only at the beginning of the 21st century did two or three of the mosques of Kazan” – and that city has approximately 50 mosques in all – “begin to use Russian.”
Some people object when people speak about “Tatar mosques” elsewhere in central Russia, but Mukhametzyanov asks rhetorically, “how else should they be called if the Tatars built them, the Tatars financed them, the Tatars worked in them for centuries, and the Tatars preserved them during the years of Soviet oppression.”
Moreover, the principle of referring to a mosque by an ethnic name is widespread and not just in Russia, he points out. In Europe, for example, there are “Turkish,” “Moroccan,” “Pakistani,” and other mosques. And so in Russia outside of the North Caucasus, there are quite properly Tatar mosques.
When one discusses them, Mukhametzyanov says, “it is necessary to understand that their so-called ‘Tatarness’ is expressed note only in history but also at the present time.” And to continue to be called a Tatar mosque, these institutions need to meet only two criteria: they must use Tatar and they must follow the Hanafi rite of Sunni Islam.
Muslims who speak other languages or who follow other legal schools or even Shiite Islam are welcome to pray in Tatar mosques, but “the imam of the mosque and also the instructors of the medrassah attached to the mosque must follow” those two traditions of Tatar Islam.
“One of the most frequently used arguments against the use of Tatar as the language of instruction is the presence in the mosques of Tatarstan of peoples from Central Asia, the Caucasus, the Middle East and so on, for whom the Tatar language is not familiar,” he says. But as for most of those from Central Asia, “Tatar is completely understandable.
But the journalist says: “Here is the question” that everyone should be asking – Why aren’t the people making these arguments equally concerned about the ability of “those Tatars who poorly understand Russian and for whom Tatar is the single means of receiving information about the faith?”
Mukhametzyanov suggests that this is “typical false Tatar logic which would insist because of the presence in the company of a single non-Tatar speaker to make all Tatars use Russian.”
Another argument sometimes employed against the use of Tatar in mosques is that “Tatar nationalists put the nation above religion.” At the same time, other “cosmopolitan Islamists declare that religion is above the nation” and therefore Muslims should either use Arabic or the most widely spread language in the area they find themselves in.
This is a false choice, the Muslim journalist insists. “For us, young Muslims, Islam and the nation are something united and indivisible, two parts of a single whole. If we speak about Tatar culture, we imply Islam and if we speak about Islam in our cultural-geographic context, we mean Tatar culture.”
He quotes with approval Imam-khatyb Batrov’s observation that “mosques for Tatars are not only centers for the rebirth of religion but also centers of national life. It would be incorrect not to take this factor into consideration” and thus fail to see how religion and nationality combine among the Tatars.
Finally, Mukhametzyanov offers what is certain to be the most unanswerable argument in favor of using Tatar and other non-Russian languages in the mosques of the Russian Federation. Everyone needs to recognize, he points out, that “Wahhabism in country is above all a Russian language phenomenon.”
Staunton, October 27 – Mosques in Tatarstan and quite possibly Tatar mosques elsewhere in the Russian Federation, so called because they were established by Tatars and served that community first, will resume using Tatar as the primary language for services, a shift that has divided both the Muslim community and the secular authorities in that country.
Muslims are divided on this point, with some insisting that Islam by its nature is supranational and that Russian both provides a more widely understood lingua franca and helps promote Islamic unity within Russia, and others arguing that there is no good reason to give preference to Russian as opposed to other languages.
And Russian officials are split as well, with most seeing the use of Russian helping to integrate Muslims into the broader society but some arguing that it has the effect of promoting a common Muslim identity against national ones and noting that in Russia today, Wahhabism and other forms of Islamist extremism, is typically a Russian language phenomenon.
The issue came to a head at an October 11th meeting of the Ulema Council of the Muslim Spiritual Directorate (MSD) of Tatarstan, a session that has now been written by Irek Mukhametzyanov, a Tatar Muslim journalist, for the Islam-portal.ru site on the Russian Internet (www.islam-portal.ru/novosti/104/1166/).
Of the many decisions the meeting took, the one that sparked the most controversy concerned a recommendation that “the mosques of the Republic of Tatarstan conduct services in Tatar.” At the same time, “with the permission of the mufti,” mullahs and imams could continue to employ Russian as a supplement to Tatar.
As Mukhametzyanov points out, the decision generated “both a positive and also a negative reaction among the Muslims of Tatarstan and of Russia. Shavkat Avyasov, the head of the Russian Islamic Heritage group and himself a Tatar resident in Moscow, was sharply opposed.
Among other things, he said, “such a decision denigrates our brother Muslims who belong to other nations and do not know Tatar.” He even suggested that standing behind this decision of the ulema were “Tatar nationalist circles” and that it reflected an increasing tendency among Tatars to speak more about “national problems” than about religion.
Rustam Batrov, the chairman of the Ulema Council of Tatarstan, defended the decision to change languages in the mosques. He suggested that Avyasov was “tilting at windmills” and ignoring the provision of the recommendation that allowed for the use of the Russian language as a supplement when necessary.
Batrov also expressed surprise that Avyasov was ignoring the reality that many Tatars, especially the elderly, understand Tatar far better than they do Russian and that their ability to participate in the mosque is reduced if the mullahs use Russian rather than their own national language.
However that may be, Mukhametzyanov continues, the issue now is bigger than that argument may suggest. “The very decision of the Ulema Council of Tatarstan is already an occasion to speak about one of the most important questions for the Tatarstan umma, the language used in the mosques.”
“For many centuries,” the Muslim journalist says, “the language [of the mosques of Tatarstan] was Tatar (old Tatar, Volga Turkic) and only at the beginning of the 21st century did two or three of the mosques of Kazan” – and that city has approximately 50 mosques in all – “begin to use Russian.”
Some people object when people speak about “Tatar mosques” elsewhere in central Russia, but Mukhametzyanov asks rhetorically, “how else should they be called if the Tatars built them, the Tatars financed them, the Tatars worked in them for centuries, and the Tatars preserved them during the years of Soviet oppression.”
Moreover, the principle of referring to a mosque by an ethnic name is widespread and not just in Russia, he points out. In Europe, for example, there are “Turkish,” “Moroccan,” “Pakistani,” and other mosques. And so in Russia outside of the North Caucasus, there are quite properly Tatar mosques.
When one discusses them, Mukhametzyanov says, “it is necessary to understand that their so-called ‘Tatarness’ is expressed note only in history but also at the present time.” And to continue to be called a Tatar mosque, these institutions need to meet only two criteria: they must use Tatar and they must follow the Hanafi rite of Sunni Islam.
Muslims who speak other languages or who follow other legal schools or even Shiite Islam are welcome to pray in Tatar mosques, but “the imam of the mosque and also the instructors of the medrassah attached to the mosque must follow” those two traditions of Tatar Islam.
“One of the most frequently used arguments against the use of Tatar as the language of instruction is the presence in the mosques of Tatarstan of peoples from Central Asia, the Caucasus, the Middle East and so on, for whom the Tatar language is not familiar,” he says. But as for most of those from Central Asia, “Tatar is completely understandable.
But the journalist says: “Here is the question” that everyone should be asking – Why aren’t the people making these arguments equally concerned about the ability of “those Tatars who poorly understand Russian and for whom Tatar is the single means of receiving information about the faith?”
Mukhametzyanov suggests that this is “typical false Tatar logic which would insist because of the presence in the company of a single non-Tatar speaker to make all Tatars use Russian.”
Another argument sometimes employed against the use of Tatar in mosques is that “Tatar nationalists put the nation above religion.” At the same time, other “cosmopolitan Islamists declare that religion is above the nation” and therefore Muslims should either use Arabic or the most widely spread language in the area they find themselves in.
This is a false choice, the Muslim journalist insists. “For us, young Muslims, Islam and the nation are something united and indivisible, two parts of a single whole. If we speak about Tatar culture, we imply Islam and if we speak about Islam in our cultural-geographic context, we mean Tatar culture.”
He quotes with approval Imam-khatyb Batrov’s observation that “mosques for Tatars are not only centers for the rebirth of religion but also centers of national life. It would be incorrect not to take this factor into consideration” and thus fail to see how religion and nationality combine among the Tatars.
Finally, Mukhametzyanov offers what is certain to be the most unanswerable argument in favor of using Tatar and other non-Russian languages in the mosques of the Russian Federation. Everyone needs to recognize, he points out, that “Wahhabism in country is above all a Russian language phenomenon.”
Window on Eurasia: Chechen Parliament Speaker Shamelessly Promises to Deliver More than 100 Percent of the Vote for Putin and Kadyrov’s United Russia
Paul Goble
Staunton, October 27 – The Moscow media are having a field day with the declaration by Dukvakha Abdurakhmanov, speaker of the Chechen parliament, that his republic will deliver more than 100 percent of the vote to the ruling United Russia Party if it should require that to win elections.
Most Russian commentators are treating this story as little more than latest extravagance of the Chechens, following as it does close on the heels of Ramzan Kadyrov’s call for Vladimir Putin to return to the Russian presidency in 2012 and remain in that office forever. But in fact, it has a more serious and sinister side, one that highlights the degradation of Russian elections.
In Soviet times, officials routinely reported that 99.9 percent of the electorate had backed Communist candidates, but even under Stalin, there was a sufficient sense of restraint that no official dared to suggest that he could do the impossible and provide more votes than there were voters.
And in post-Soviet times, while the falsification of election results has been rampant -- especially in the North Caucasus, where the reported percentages have approached Soviet levels -- officials up to now have defended the results as accurate rather than flaunting their obvious ability to provide whatever numbers the powers that be above them might want.
But now, in an action that invites the question “have they no shame?” Abdurakhmanov, according to the Ekho Moskvy report, demonstrated by his remarks that “when one is talking about elections in the Chechen Republic, the laws of mathematics cease to operate,” at least according to the Chechen speaker (echo.msk.ru/news/721620-echo.html).
“If United Russia needs to receive 115 to 120 percent of the votes,” he continued, “we will be able to achieve that result,” at least as long as Ramzan Kadyrov and Vladimir Putin stand at its head. If someone else were there, he said, “no one would vote for it,” yet another indication of what that party in fact is.
Abdurakhmanov equally shameless asserted that “at the present time, there is no corruption in Chechnya. It exists in Moscow and in St. Petersburg but in Chechnya there is simply no one to bribe.” In the future, that will change, he said, once we have reestablished “industry, business and the banking system.”
And the Chechen speaker made his own contribution to the rapidly expanding cult of personality around Ramzan Kadyrov. That Chechen leader, Abdurakhmanov said, is “an outstanding official in the strengthening of Russian statehood” and “the most irreconcilable fighter against terrorism.”
Unless more senior Russian officials denounce Abdurakhmanov’s remarks or even insist on his and his immediate superior’s dismissal, they too will be contributing to rising public cynicism among Russians about elections and indeed all numbers, including those from the just completed census, that the powers that be issue.
Indeed, in many ways, the Chechen parliament speaker’s words represent even more of a challenge to President Dmitry Medvedev’s oft-stated commitment to the rule of law than did Ramzan Kadyrov’s recent panegyric to Putin. And thus whether he intended it or not, Abdurakhmanov by his very shamelessness has posed a challenge to the incumbent president
Staunton, October 27 – The Moscow media are having a field day with the declaration by Dukvakha Abdurakhmanov, speaker of the Chechen parliament, that his republic will deliver more than 100 percent of the vote to the ruling United Russia Party if it should require that to win elections.
Most Russian commentators are treating this story as little more than latest extravagance of the Chechens, following as it does close on the heels of Ramzan Kadyrov’s call for Vladimir Putin to return to the Russian presidency in 2012 and remain in that office forever. But in fact, it has a more serious and sinister side, one that highlights the degradation of Russian elections.
In Soviet times, officials routinely reported that 99.9 percent of the electorate had backed Communist candidates, but even under Stalin, there was a sufficient sense of restraint that no official dared to suggest that he could do the impossible and provide more votes than there were voters.
And in post-Soviet times, while the falsification of election results has been rampant -- especially in the North Caucasus, where the reported percentages have approached Soviet levels -- officials up to now have defended the results as accurate rather than flaunting their obvious ability to provide whatever numbers the powers that be above them might want.
But now, in an action that invites the question “have they no shame?” Abdurakhmanov, according to the Ekho Moskvy report, demonstrated by his remarks that “when one is talking about elections in the Chechen Republic, the laws of mathematics cease to operate,” at least according to the Chechen speaker (echo.msk.ru/news/721620-echo.html).
“If United Russia needs to receive 115 to 120 percent of the votes,” he continued, “we will be able to achieve that result,” at least as long as Ramzan Kadyrov and Vladimir Putin stand at its head. If someone else were there, he said, “no one would vote for it,” yet another indication of what that party in fact is.
Abdurakhmanov equally shameless asserted that “at the present time, there is no corruption in Chechnya. It exists in Moscow and in St. Petersburg but in Chechnya there is simply no one to bribe.” In the future, that will change, he said, once we have reestablished “industry, business and the banking system.”
And the Chechen speaker made his own contribution to the rapidly expanding cult of personality around Ramzan Kadyrov. That Chechen leader, Abdurakhmanov said, is “an outstanding official in the strengthening of Russian statehood” and “the most irreconcilable fighter against terrorism.”
Unless more senior Russian officials denounce Abdurakhmanov’s remarks or even insist on his and his immediate superior’s dismissal, they too will be contributing to rising public cynicism among Russians about elections and indeed all numbers, including those from the just completed census, that the powers that be issue.
Indeed, in many ways, the Chechen parliament speaker’s words represent even more of a challenge to President Dmitry Medvedev’s oft-stated commitment to the rule of law than did Ramzan Kadyrov’s recent panegyric to Putin. And thus whether he intended it or not, Abdurakhmanov by his very shamelessness has posed a challenge to the incumbent president
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