Paul Goble
Staunton, May 19 – In the nearly two years since Russia recognized Abkhazia as an independent country, relations between Moscow and Sukhum have deteriorated with many in the former unhappy that they have to pay such a high price for geopolitics and many in the latter suspicious that Russia is a threat to Abkhaz independence, according to a Moscow observer.
In yesterday’s “Komsomolskaya Pravda,” Vladimir Vorsobin, that paper’s political observer, explained why “after recognition, ever more problems are appearing” in the Russian-Abkhazian relationship on such questions as resorts, religious administrations, property ownership and even the border between the two (msk.kp.ru/daily/25687/891281/).
To the extent that and as long as Abkhazian leaders viewed Tbilisi and Washington as the main problems, relations between Abkhazia and Russia were “simplified,” with people in both of their capitals subordinating any disputes to the broader and more important geopolitical problems of relations with Georgia and the United States.
But “in recent months,” this dynamic has changed. Tbilisi and Washington are less often viewed as credible opponents, and people in both Sukhum and Moscow are focusing on their own differences, differences made all the more troubling, Vorsobin says, because of the amount of money Russia is spending and the natural suspiciousness of the Abkhazians about outsiders.
The Abkhazians have become outraged by Russian cutbacks in support for sanitaria, and the Russians in turn have been upset by what they see as shady practices and even illegal actions by the Abkhazians – and by the efforts of the Russian embassy in Sukhum to excuse the Abkhazians rather than defend Russian citizens.
Other issues have added to the tensions. The Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church has been reluctant to see the Orthodox in Abkhazia become an independent church lest that undermine Moscow’s claims in Ukraine and elsewhere but at the same time has acted in ways that seem intended to put the Abkhazian Orthodox under its domain.
Some Orthodox clergy in Abkhazia openly declare, the Moscow journalist says, that “the future of the Abkhazian church must be constructed not only on the basis of ties with the Russian church but also with other Orthodox churches, including the Greek and Serbian. There must be multi-polarity in the foreign policy of the Abkhazian church.”
Just last Sunday, the Abkhazian Orthodox split, with part agreeing to be subordinate to the Russian Orthodox Church and part rejecting that approach, such splitting the Orthodox “front” and exacerbating tensions between Russians and Abkhazians. (For details on this, see www.portal-credo.ru/site/?act=comment&id=1875).
Other areas where tensions are high concern property that the Russians claim but that the Abkhazians have seized, and what may surprise many even more over the border between Abkhazia and the Russian Federation. Vorsobin offers a map showing a portion of the northwest part of Abkhazia that Moscow wants transferred to it.
The Russian side makes two arguments. On the one hand, some of the villages in that region are overwhelmingly ethnic Russian. And on the other, this part of Abkhazia is very near the places where Moscow hopes to stage the 2014 Olympics. Having the territory under direct Russian control would make that task easier.
But from the Abkhazian perspective, Russia’s interest in part of Abkhazia’s territory is seen as the effort of another outside power to seize Abkhazian lands. Indeed, the Moscow observer says, “hot heads” in Sukhum now accuse Moscow of evil intentions and “suggest that Moscow repent for expelling a half million Abkhazians to Turkey in the 19th century.”
Out of geopolitical calculations, the Russian embassy in Sukhum has tried to keep all this out of the press, obviously without success, and Russian government officials have rejected Duma complaints about how much money Moscow is spending on the ungrateful Abkhazians. “The main thing,” Russian officials say, “is geopolitics,” not money.
That is “useful advice,” Vorsobin says, but it is clear from his article that he does not expect many on either side of this deepening divide to take it for much longer.
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Window on Eurasia: Muscovites Want Their Children to Study in Schools without Migrants
Paul Goble
Staunton, May 19 – Now that “up to 60 percent” of the pupils in the primary schools of the Russian capital are children of migrants who do not speak Russian well, an increasing number of Muscovite parents are doing whatever they can to ensure that their children go to those schools which have few or no migrant children, according to a Moscow newspaper.
Educational officials in Moscow prefer that parents send their children to the schools that are closest to their homes, but the parents of many believe that their children will have a less successful academic experience if they are surrounded by other pupils for whom Russian is not a native language (www.kp.ru/daily/25688.4/892109/).
As one father put it, an article in “Komsomolskaya Pravda” today reports, he would rather have his child be in a school nearby so that he and his family would not have to get up so early. But that school is “”full of these … How can the teacher teach if half of the pupils do not speak Russian!””
Such attitudes undoubtedly reflect both xenophobia of some parents and worries about the well-being their children, but the situation has already reached the point, the paper says, that Muscovites now speak about “’white’” and “’black’” classes because in many schools on the outskirts of Moscow half or more of the pupils are “children of migrant workers.”
The low Russian language competence of many of the migrant children puts a serious burden on classroom teachers, the paper continues. Those who complain about the difficulties of keeping the interest of native Russian speakers while developing Russian language skills among others are told by their directors: “’You’re a teacher; teach!’”
Such problems in the classroom are creating “a serious problem for many school directors” in the Russian capital, “Komsomolskaya Pravda” says. Some believe that the best thing is to segregate those with poor or non-existent Russian language schools while others are convinced that the best way for such pupils to learn is to be thrown in with Russian pupils.
And many of these directors are upset because, the paper notes, “in essence, the only social institution which adapts [migrants in Moscow] if not the adults then at least their children for life in the Russian capital is the school,” an institution that is already asked with ever fewer resources to carry out other tasks as well.
There is a network of special classes where Russia is taught as a foreign language. In Moscow at the present time, there are 211 such groups, but they cannot hope to serve the hundreds of thousands of migrant children. And there are only ten schools entirely devoted to this task in Moscow in which are enrolled all of 417 children.
There are many reasons for this shortage besides the obvious financial difficulties. Many parents “often don’t want their child to lose a year,” as they assume those in such schools do. Others don’t want to take the trouble involved in getting their children into such schools. And still a third group resists because its members are unsure of how long they’ll stay in Moscow.
Some Moscow teachers report that in springtime, they suddenly lose “half of their pupils” if these are from Central Asia because the children are sent home to work in the fields of their relatives. And others say that female Muslim pupils are often pulled out of class because their parents don’t believe they need much education at all.
Most teachers involved with such children, however, are committed to providing them with the instruction they have a right to as residents of the Russian Federation. But unfortunately, they sometimes face a problem: “There is no legal foundation” for insisting that a foreign child study Russian. Indeed, the paper says, “no one has the right to do that.”
Many observers are likely to view all this simply as evidence of nationalism among the pupils, but the reality is more complicated. According to the Moscow journalist, “teachers, directors, and the children themselves assured [him] that there is much less nationalism in the capital’s schools than there is outside their doors.”
Staunton, May 19 – Now that “up to 60 percent” of the pupils in the primary schools of the Russian capital are children of migrants who do not speak Russian well, an increasing number of Muscovite parents are doing whatever they can to ensure that their children go to those schools which have few or no migrant children, according to a Moscow newspaper.
Educational officials in Moscow prefer that parents send their children to the schools that are closest to their homes, but the parents of many believe that their children will have a less successful academic experience if they are surrounded by other pupils for whom Russian is not a native language (www.kp.ru/daily/25688.4/892109/).
As one father put it, an article in “Komsomolskaya Pravda” today reports, he would rather have his child be in a school nearby so that he and his family would not have to get up so early. But that school is “”full of these … How can the teacher teach if half of the pupils do not speak Russian!””
Such attitudes undoubtedly reflect both xenophobia of some parents and worries about the well-being their children, but the situation has already reached the point, the paper says, that Muscovites now speak about “’white’” and “’black’” classes because in many schools on the outskirts of Moscow half or more of the pupils are “children of migrant workers.”
The low Russian language competence of many of the migrant children puts a serious burden on classroom teachers, the paper continues. Those who complain about the difficulties of keeping the interest of native Russian speakers while developing Russian language skills among others are told by their directors: “’You’re a teacher; teach!’”
Such problems in the classroom are creating “a serious problem for many school directors” in the Russian capital, “Komsomolskaya Pravda” says. Some believe that the best thing is to segregate those with poor or non-existent Russian language schools while others are convinced that the best way for such pupils to learn is to be thrown in with Russian pupils.
And many of these directors are upset because, the paper notes, “in essence, the only social institution which adapts [migrants in Moscow] if not the adults then at least their children for life in the Russian capital is the school,” an institution that is already asked with ever fewer resources to carry out other tasks as well.
There is a network of special classes where Russia is taught as a foreign language. In Moscow at the present time, there are 211 such groups, but they cannot hope to serve the hundreds of thousands of migrant children. And there are only ten schools entirely devoted to this task in Moscow in which are enrolled all of 417 children.
There are many reasons for this shortage besides the obvious financial difficulties. Many parents “often don’t want their child to lose a year,” as they assume those in such schools do. Others don’t want to take the trouble involved in getting their children into such schools. And still a third group resists because its members are unsure of how long they’ll stay in Moscow.
Some Moscow teachers report that in springtime, they suddenly lose “half of their pupils” if these are from Central Asia because the children are sent home to work in the fields of their relatives. And others say that female Muslim pupils are often pulled out of class because their parents don’t believe they need much education at all.
Most teachers involved with such children, however, are committed to providing them with the instruction they have a right to as residents of the Russian Federation. But unfortunately, they sometimes face a problem: “There is no legal foundation” for insisting that a foreign child study Russian. Indeed, the paper says, “no one has the right to do that.”
Many observers are likely to view all this simply as evidence of nationalism among the pupils, but the reality is more complicated. According to the Moscow journalist, “teachers, directors, and the children themselves assured [him] that there is much less nationalism in the capital’s schools than there is outside their doors.”
Window on Eurasia: More than Half of Bashkortostan’s Imams above Pension Age, Survey Finds
Paul Goble
Staunton, May 19 – More than half of the imams and muezzins of the mosques of Bashkortostan are beyond the normal age for pensioners, according to a recent survey, and 20 percent of all Muslim religious leaders in that republic lack any religious training, a situation common in Middle Volga and one that points to challenges for both Muslims and Moscow.
Not only do these numbers suggest the approach of a radical generational change in the leadership of the Muslim community there, but they open the way to the introduction of even more graduates of Islamic training centers abroad, a development that could unsettle the parishes there as well as increase tensions between the Middle Volga Muslims and Moscow.
These are among the many issues currently roiling the Islamic community in the Middle Volga that Ruslan khazrat Sayakhov, the deputy head of the Bashkortostan Muslim Spiritual Directorate (MSD) responsible for educational issues and external relations, discusses in an interview posted on the Islamrf.ru portal today (www.islamrf.ru/news/umma/faces/16102/).
The problems of the umma in Bashkortostan and the need for new leading cadres, Sayakhov says, were shown by a re-attestation survey of the imams and muezzins of the republic’s MSD. “More than 50 percent of the spiritual workers are people who have long ago passed pension age,” with some imams being over 80 years of age.
Such people, of course, “are extremely respected and wise,” but often cannot keep up with “contemporary people,” he continues. Moreover, “on the order of 20 percent of all these workers do not have even a primary religious education.” Not surprisingly, parishes “ever more often are asking for the sending of young specialists” to take their places.
Unfortunately, there are two few such people who can be sent. Russia’s own Muslim educational system is still being built, Sayakhov says, and consequently, many people are looking at younger people who have received training in Muslim universities and medrassahs abroad.
Despite the fears of some, those who have received such training often benefit from it, the deputy MSD chief who himself studied for eight years in the Arab world adds. They of necessity learn Arabic far better than those who do not go abroad. They are exposed to different approaches and experiences. And they bring this back to others.
Clearly, he continues, it is important to work carefully with those who have studied abroad. They need to be screened and clear goals need to be set, and they must operate under the guidance of more senior Muslim leaders who have greater experience with traditional Islam in the Middle Volga.
Those who say that the Muslim universities in Egypt and elsewhere are “preparing radicals” and that “their graduates fight with arms in their hands against federal forces in the North Caucasus” are making assertions that are “not completely based” in reality, the Bashkortostan MSD deputy head says.
Each student whether in the Russian Federation or abroad “chooses for himself” what he wants. “No one can impose on [him] an alien ideology,” Sayakhov says. On the basis of his own experience with and knowledge of Islamic educational institutions “in Sudan, Egypt and Saudi Arabai,” he adds, “an individual can find in each of them” that which corresponds to his search.
When one talks about “the contemporary problems of Islamic education,” he goes on, the question needs to be ask “whom do we want to see ‘at the other end’? What knowledge and personal qualities must an individual have who has decided to devote himself to work in the religious sphere?”
There is much to be learned from the jaded traditions of a century ago, Sayakhov says, and he expresses the hope that “in the next few years, that colossal work which is being conducted in this area will allow the discovery” of the best possible combination of a knowledge of Islam, the Arab world, and the Tatar-Bashkir past.
Staunton, May 19 – More than half of the imams and muezzins of the mosques of Bashkortostan are beyond the normal age for pensioners, according to a recent survey, and 20 percent of all Muslim religious leaders in that republic lack any religious training, a situation common in Middle Volga and one that points to challenges for both Muslims and Moscow.
Not only do these numbers suggest the approach of a radical generational change in the leadership of the Muslim community there, but they open the way to the introduction of even more graduates of Islamic training centers abroad, a development that could unsettle the parishes there as well as increase tensions between the Middle Volga Muslims and Moscow.
These are among the many issues currently roiling the Islamic community in the Middle Volga that Ruslan khazrat Sayakhov, the deputy head of the Bashkortostan Muslim Spiritual Directorate (MSD) responsible for educational issues and external relations, discusses in an interview posted on the Islamrf.ru portal today (www.islamrf.ru/news/umma/faces/16102/).
The problems of the umma in Bashkortostan and the need for new leading cadres, Sayakhov says, were shown by a re-attestation survey of the imams and muezzins of the republic’s MSD. “More than 50 percent of the spiritual workers are people who have long ago passed pension age,” with some imams being over 80 years of age.
Such people, of course, “are extremely respected and wise,” but often cannot keep up with “contemporary people,” he continues. Moreover, “on the order of 20 percent of all these workers do not have even a primary religious education.” Not surprisingly, parishes “ever more often are asking for the sending of young specialists” to take their places.
Unfortunately, there are two few such people who can be sent. Russia’s own Muslim educational system is still being built, Sayakhov says, and consequently, many people are looking at younger people who have received training in Muslim universities and medrassahs abroad.
Despite the fears of some, those who have received such training often benefit from it, the deputy MSD chief who himself studied for eight years in the Arab world adds. They of necessity learn Arabic far better than those who do not go abroad. They are exposed to different approaches and experiences. And they bring this back to others.
Clearly, he continues, it is important to work carefully with those who have studied abroad. They need to be screened and clear goals need to be set, and they must operate under the guidance of more senior Muslim leaders who have greater experience with traditional Islam in the Middle Volga.
Those who say that the Muslim universities in Egypt and elsewhere are “preparing radicals” and that “their graduates fight with arms in their hands against federal forces in the North Caucasus” are making assertions that are “not completely based” in reality, the Bashkortostan MSD deputy head says.
Each student whether in the Russian Federation or abroad “chooses for himself” what he wants. “No one can impose on [him] an alien ideology,” Sayakhov says. On the basis of his own experience with and knowledge of Islamic educational institutions “in Sudan, Egypt and Saudi Arabai,” he adds, “an individual can find in each of them” that which corresponds to his search.
When one talks about “the contemporary problems of Islamic education,” he goes on, the question needs to be ask “whom do we want to see ‘at the other end’? What knowledge and personal qualities must an individual have who has decided to devote himself to work in the religious sphere?”
There is much to be learned from the jaded traditions of a century ago, Sayakhov says, and he expresses the hope that “in the next few years, that colossal work which is being conducted in this area will allow the discovery” of the best possible combination of a knowledge of Islam, the Arab world, and the Tatar-Bashkir past.
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