Paul Goble
Staunton, April 15 – Religious leaders, heraldry experts, and other commentators have rejected Mufti Talgat Tajuddin’s call for putting a cresent on the coat of arms of Russia, but a senior official in the Moscow Patriarchate has opened the way for more controversy by suggesting a Muslim crescent could be put on the coats of arms of Muslim republics and regions.
That is because the suggestion of Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, the head of the Patriarchate’s Department for Relations between Church and Society, could open the floodgates by demands from Muslims in various parts of Russia for just such representation and create a checkerboard of Muslim regions as opposed to non-Muslim ones.
And the symbolism of such an obvious division – and it would certainly change over time – would undercut efforts by Moscow to overcome inter-religious hostility and promote a common national identity and could reignite calls by some Muslim leaders to create Muslim political parties, something not now allowed by Russian law, to press for crescents.
In a statement to the media today, Chaplin, who is a close protégé of Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill, spoke out against Tajuddin’s proposal to put a Muslim crescent on on of the equals on the coast of arms of Russia, arguing that such a change was unnecessary given the tradition the current shield with crosses reflects (www.nr2.ru/society/328369.html).
“That historical form of the Russian coat of arms,” Chaplin said, “which has existed already for many centuries is historically justified. Islam is a local phenomenon for Russia [as] it is distributed as the dominating religion in particular regions. On the coats of arms of these regions may be both crescents and other Islamic symbols.”
“But on the Russian coat of arms, a cross has been present on the crowns over many centuries,” the Patriarchate official continued, adding that in his view “it is not necessary to change anything” at least for this symbol of the Russian Federation and its centuries-old traditions.
Chaplin’s remarks came in reaction to a proposal Talgat Tajuddin, who has occasionally styled himself as the “Mufti of Holy Russia” and head of the Central Muslim Spiritual Directorate (MSD), made in the course of an interview published in “Moskovskiye novosti” earlier today (mn.ru/newspaper_freetime/20110415/301066658.html).
Tajuddin, who has a reputation for flamboyance, told the paper’s Elena Suponina that he had sent his proposal to replkace on of the crosses on the Russian coat of arms with a Muslim crescent moon to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and had discussed it with President Dmitry Medvedev.
As the mufti pointed out, “the Russian coat of arms is a two-headed equal. All three crowns of this eagle – two on the head and one inbetween above them are marked with crosses. But in Russia there live 20 million Muslims. This is 18 percent of the population, and we are Russian Muslims, not from Saudi Arabia … Africa or the moon.”
“Our ancestors have lived here for millennia. By the will of the Most High we are united in a state. And a neighbor is equal to a brother. We are a constituent part of a single state. But then, where must a Muslim carry his passport on which the coat of arms is reproduced? In his left pocket, of course, near the heart!”
Prior to 1917, Tajuddin continued, “Muslims in the army gave their oath on the Koran. There were regimental mullahs andimams. They were assigned by spiritual administrations. During the war with Turkey, our ancestors did nto consider they were fighting against Muslims: they were defending their motherland, great Russia.”
“Recall the heroism of the Bashkir cavalry in 1812,” Tajuddin said; “they went into attack first. And in 1945, for example, my grandfather advanced to Berlin.”
“In Russia has been achieved a synthesis of a kind that never was in Europe or America,” the mufti continued. Here met East and West. In order that this patriotism not disappear among our children and grandchildren, we humbly ask to introduce certain changes in the coat o farms of our common land.”
Specially, he said, “we ask that one head of the eagle be crowned with a crescent moon and the other with an Orthodox cross. And that crown which is in the middle be both. Then not one enemy will be able to use the religious factor to harm the unity and integrity of our fatherland.”
In response, Russia’s master of heralds rejected this idea (www.interfax-religion.ru/islam/?act=news&div=40352) as did many Muslims (echo.msk.ru/news/766358-echo.html), Jews (www.argumenti.ru/society/2011/04/102414), and representatives of the human rights community (www.interfax-religion.ru/islam/?act=news&div=40350).
That united front of rejection makes Chaplin’s remark all the more curious – and at least potentially all the more dangerous, even though it may be walked back by other Orthodox hierarchs or used by them to suggest that the Moscow Patriarchate is, on this issue at least, more liberal and tolerant than many suspect.
Friday, April 15, 2011
Window on Eurasia: Absent Modernization, Russia Faces Massive Brain Drain and Exodus of Business, Kremlin Advisor Says
Paul Goble
Staunton, April 15 – If modernization does not take place over the next few years, a senior Kremlin advisor says, Russia will suffer a massive “brain drain” and the departure of much of its businesses, the largest to the West and the small and mid-sized to Kazakhstan, leaving it an “uninteresting” bridge between China and Europe.
But despite that prospect, Aleksandr Auzan, a member of the Presidential commission on modernization and technological development of the economy of Russia, concludes sadly, the possibility that Russia will choose to modernize is relatively small, a reflection of short-term thinking and confusion between inertia and stability (www.nr2.ru/chel/328413.html).
Auzan, a professor at Moscow State University, says that this brain drain is already starting: “half of his students, elite specialists, are leaving to work abroad and not even thinking about returning.” In their wake “business is departing, big business toward the West and small and mid-sized toward Kazakhstan.”
In this case, the economist says, Russia will have a future like the one described in Vladimir Sorokin’s novels: It will be a country “across which will pass a 15-lane highway between China and Europe.” That won’t be a complete tragedy, he adds, but Russia will “simply be a country of little interest,” one from which all talented people will leave.”
Moreover, in the absence of modernization, “if Russia begins to improve the quality of education, then even more specialists will leave.” If they are to be retained, then there need to be places of interest for them. “The oil pipeline doesn’t need smart and qualified people,” or at least “it needs few of them. And this is the tragedy of the country.”
“Who must change the country?” Auzan asks rhetorically. “The majority of citizens,” he points out, “do not want any modernization; a minority wants it but doesn’t believe in it,” with “all pointing to stability as the achievement of the Putin era.” But economists like himself, Auzan continues, don’t see this stability as firm or long-lasting.
“There are undoubted results,” he concedes. In the first five years of this century, Auzan notes, Russians experienced a 11-12 percent growth in their incomes. “But now they aren’t: inflation is eating everything quite quickly.” As a result, “the economy of the country is becoming ever worse.”
“It is worse than at the start of the 2000s,” Auzan says, “because it is still more completely based on raw materials exports … We are ever weaker in an international sense [and] we are slowly-slowly sinking.” Indeed, World Bank experts now say that “Russia is the weakest of the developing countries.”
What success Moscow has had in maintaining stability, the economic advisor says, is based on “a miracle of not very divine origin.” Indeed, he says, “for this [stabilitiy] it was necessary to conclude a pact with the devil.” Such a pact can by inertia work for five to 20 years, but then “problems will begin and very rapidly.”
Auzan says that countries which have successfully passed through the process of modernization have had several specific characteristics. They have seen “a growth in the values of self-realization over the values of survival, an orientation to results rather than process, a growth in individualism, that is, a willingness to act despite what others say.”
“But the chief one,” he says, “in countries which have successfully passed through modernization, the distance of the powers [from the population] has fallen. That is, people begin to relate to the state as something not distant from themselves but toward which they have a relationship and in which they can get involved.”
Auzan suggests that “the chances for modernization in Russia in generally are not very high at present.” Because of high oil prices, “we are condemned to stagnation” because modernization does not begin when people feel they are doing well but rather when they conclude that they are not.
Moreover, he says, “Russia is not ready for modernization and for technological leaps and a storm of innovations.” For that to be the case, there would need to be what “already exists in a number of developed countries: effective laws, judges, patents and the like. Everything which does not exist in Russia.”
For Russia to modernize, even when a commitment to doing so finally emerges as a result of a recognition of the threats ahead, Auzan says will require “not less than 20 years” because as many forget, “modernization is a process that is economic in its outcome but socio-cultural in its content. Therefore, it is a lengthy one.”
Staunton, April 15 – If modernization does not take place over the next few years, a senior Kremlin advisor says, Russia will suffer a massive “brain drain” and the departure of much of its businesses, the largest to the West and the small and mid-sized to Kazakhstan, leaving it an “uninteresting” bridge between China and Europe.
But despite that prospect, Aleksandr Auzan, a member of the Presidential commission on modernization and technological development of the economy of Russia, concludes sadly, the possibility that Russia will choose to modernize is relatively small, a reflection of short-term thinking and confusion between inertia and stability (www.nr2.ru/chel/328413.html).
Auzan, a professor at Moscow State University, says that this brain drain is already starting: “half of his students, elite specialists, are leaving to work abroad and not even thinking about returning.” In their wake “business is departing, big business toward the West and small and mid-sized toward Kazakhstan.”
In this case, the economist says, Russia will have a future like the one described in Vladimir Sorokin’s novels: It will be a country “across which will pass a 15-lane highway between China and Europe.” That won’t be a complete tragedy, he adds, but Russia will “simply be a country of little interest,” one from which all talented people will leave.”
Moreover, in the absence of modernization, “if Russia begins to improve the quality of education, then even more specialists will leave.” If they are to be retained, then there need to be places of interest for them. “The oil pipeline doesn’t need smart and qualified people,” or at least “it needs few of them. And this is the tragedy of the country.”
“Who must change the country?” Auzan asks rhetorically. “The majority of citizens,” he points out, “do not want any modernization; a minority wants it but doesn’t believe in it,” with “all pointing to stability as the achievement of the Putin era.” But economists like himself, Auzan continues, don’t see this stability as firm or long-lasting.
“There are undoubted results,” he concedes. In the first five years of this century, Auzan notes, Russians experienced a 11-12 percent growth in their incomes. “But now they aren’t: inflation is eating everything quite quickly.” As a result, “the economy of the country is becoming ever worse.”
“It is worse than at the start of the 2000s,” Auzan says, “because it is still more completely based on raw materials exports … We are ever weaker in an international sense [and] we are slowly-slowly sinking.” Indeed, World Bank experts now say that “Russia is the weakest of the developing countries.”
What success Moscow has had in maintaining stability, the economic advisor says, is based on “a miracle of not very divine origin.” Indeed, he says, “for this [stabilitiy] it was necessary to conclude a pact with the devil.” Such a pact can by inertia work for five to 20 years, but then “problems will begin and very rapidly.”
Auzan says that countries which have successfully passed through the process of modernization have had several specific characteristics. They have seen “a growth in the values of self-realization over the values of survival, an orientation to results rather than process, a growth in individualism, that is, a willingness to act despite what others say.”
“But the chief one,” he says, “in countries which have successfully passed through modernization, the distance of the powers [from the population] has fallen. That is, people begin to relate to the state as something not distant from themselves but toward which they have a relationship and in which they can get involved.”
Auzan suggests that “the chances for modernization in Russia in generally are not very high at present.” Because of high oil prices, “we are condemned to stagnation” because modernization does not begin when people feel they are doing well but rather when they conclude that they are not.
Moreover, he says, “Russia is not ready for modernization and for technological leaps and a storm of innovations.” For that to be the case, there would need to be what “already exists in a number of developed countries: effective laws, judges, patents and the like. Everything which does not exist in Russia.”
For Russia to modernize, even when a commitment to doing so finally emerges as a result of a recognition of the threats ahead, Auzan says will require “not less than 20 years” because as many forget, “modernization is a process that is economic in its outcome but socio-cultural in its content. Therefore, it is a lengthy one.”
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Window on Eurasia: Chinese Organized Crime Said a Threat to Moscow-Bejing Ties
Paul Goble
Staunton, April 14 – The arrest in Moscow earlier this week of a Chinese gang member who was holding other Chinese citizens as hostages called attention to the presence of Chinese organized crime in the Russian Federation, a phenomenon that is now so large that one commentator has suggested it threatens warming ties between Moscow and Bejing.
On Wednesday, Moscow media reported that the Moscow militia had detained a Chinese citizen who was holding at gun point several of his compatriots hostage, including at least one who was reportedly owed a large sum of money to a Chinese organized crime family (top.rbc.ru/incidents/12/04/2011/574906.shtml).
Before storming the apartment where the hostages were located, the Russian militia attempted to negotiate their release. Then, they called a Chinese embassy officer to the scene, and a decision was taken to seize the gun man by force. The Chinese special services said that the man under arrest is a representative of “one of the Chinese organized criminal groups.”
The existence of ethnically based organized criminal groups in the Russian Federation, including those consisting of ethnic Chinese, is hardly news. But over the last several years, they have become increasingly brazen and heavily involved not just in shakedowns like the one just mentioned but also in bilateral trade between Russia and China.
In a report on the Fondsk.ru portal, Nikolay Yershov suggests that the growth of such criminal activity since the early years of the last decade and “especially in the last two to three years” has accelerated to the point that it is undermining what had been warming bilateral economic and political ties (www.fondsk.ru/news/2011/04/07/kitajskie-opg-ugroza-razvitiju-ekonomicheskih-svjazej-rossii-s-knr.html).
Russian law enforcement agencies say, Yershov reports, that that such crime has become a particular problem “in foreign trade with China.” Much of it involves “complete financial schemes and technical cleverness, the use of contemporary Internet technology, electronic payment systems, and a deep knowledge of financial monitoring and exchange procedures.”
The most important reason for “the increased attention of Chinese organized criminal groups to Russian business,” the journalist continues, are “favorable economic conditions and a stable and high interest by entrepreneurs from the Russian Federation in doing business with China.”
Among the largest Chinese criminal groups involved in such activities, officials say, is the Tientsin-Hebei grouping, “which is based in the cities of Tientsin and Shitsiajuan and has ‘branches’ in Beijing, Harbin and Guandung Province. It specializes in extracting money from Russian companies by securing advances greater than the purchase price of the goods to be sold.
This family does so by sending false prices via the Internet, securing the money and then disappearing. Among the sectors most affected by this particular crime are chemical products, but logistics, consulting and management activities are also involved, Yerzhov says. This Chinese crime family also is involved in fraudulent export contracts for Chinese raw materials.
Some of the firms involved in these activities remain under the control of Chinese organized crime for lengthy periods of time, but they too disband very quickly whenever the authorities in either China or Russia begin to look into what they are doing, although they hide behind various false front companies and often escape attention.
A relatively new area of Chinese organized criminal group activity involves the stock and exchange markets. Russians are offered a chance to invest from 500,000 US dollars up and then paid dividends for only a few months before the Chinese criminals declare that the investment has collapsed in value. They then disappear.
“Regrettably,” Yershov says, “the wave of crimes toward Russian participants in the foreign economic activity of China has not generated the necessary reaction from the side of the Chinese Ministry of Public Security,” a body whose initials translated into Russia is the wonderfully named MOB.
Moreover, he continues, the MOB’s “territorial subdivisions” in Tientsin and elsewhere “for reasons that are not understandable refuse to accept declarations and appeals from Russian and foreign citizens” regarding such activities. Some MOB officials say that they won’t get involved unless losses exceed 300,000 yuan – about 45,000 US dollars.
The activities of the Chinese organized criminal groups are inflicting “serious harm to the develop0ment of economic ties between the two countries. [Consequently,] the Chinese sides ignoring of facts of crimes threatens to undermine the reputation of Chinese business both in the Russian business community and in the international arena.”
Staunton, April 14 – The arrest in Moscow earlier this week of a Chinese gang member who was holding other Chinese citizens as hostages called attention to the presence of Chinese organized crime in the Russian Federation, a phenomenon that is now so large that one commentator has suggested it threatens warming ties between Moscow and Bejing.
On Wednesday, Moscow media reported that the Moscow militia had detained a Chinese citizen who was holding at gun point several of his compatriots hostage, including at least one who was reportedly owed a large sum of money to a Chinese organized crime family (top.rbc.ru/incidents/12/04/2011/574906.shtml).
Before storming the apartment where the hostages were located, the Russian militia attempted to negotiate their release. Then, they called a Chinese embassy officer to the scene, and a decision was taken to seize the gun man by force. The Chinese special services said that the man under arrest is a representative of “one of the Chinese organized criminal groups.”
The existence of ethnically based organized criminal groups in the Russian Federation, including those consisting of ethnic Chinese, is hardly news. But over the last several years, they have become increasingly brazen and heavily involved not just in shakedowns like the one just mentioned but also in bilateral trade between Russia and China.
In a report on the Fondsk.ru portal, Nikolay Yershov suggests that the growth of such criminal activity since the early years of the last decade and “especially in the last two to three years” has accelerated to the point that it is undermining what had been warming bilateral economic and political ties (www.fondsk.ru/news/2011/04/07/kitajskie-opg-ugroza-razvitiju-ekonomicheskih-svjazej-rossii-s-knr.html).
Russian law enforcement agencies say, Yershov reports, that that such crime has become a particular problem “in foreign trade with China.” Much of it involves “complete financial schemes and technical cleverness, the use of contemporary Internet technology, electronic payment systems, and a deep knowledge of financial monitoring and exchange procedures.”
The most important reason for “the increased attention of Chinese organized criminal groups to Russian business,” the journalist continues, are “favorable economic conditions and a stable and high interest by entrepreneurs from the Russian Federation in doing business with China.”
Among the largest Chinese criminal groups involved in such activities, officials say, is the Tientsin-Hebei grouping, “which is based in the cities of Tientsin and Shitsiajuan and has ‘branches’ in Beijing, Harbin and Guandung Province. It specializes in extracting money from Russian companies by securing advances greater than the purchase price of the goods to be sold.
This family does so by sending false prices via the Internet, securing the money and then disappearing. Among the sectors most affected by this particular crime are chemical products, but logistics, consulting and management activities are also involved, Yerzhov says. This Chinese crime family also is involved in fraudulent export contracts for Chinese raw materials.
Some of the firms involved in these activities remain under the control of Chinese organized crime for lengthy periods of time, but they too disband very quickly whenever the authorities in either China or Russia begin to look into what they are doing, although they hide behind various false front companies and often escape attention.
A relatively new area of Chinese organized criminal group activity involves the stock and exchange markets. Russians are offered a chance to invest from 500,000 US dollars up and then paid dividends for only a few months before the Chinese criminals declare that the investment has collapsed in value. They then disappear.
“Regrettably,” Yershov says, “the wave of crimes toward Russian participants in the foreign economic activity of China has not generated the necessary reaction from the side of the Chinese Ministry of Public Security,” a body whose initials translated into Russia is the wonderfully named MOB.
Moreover, he continues, the MOB’s “territorial subdivisions” in Tientsin and elsewhere “for reasons that are not understandable refuse to accept declarations and appeals from Russian and foreign citizens” regarding such activities. Some MOB officials say that they won’t get involved unless losses exceed 300,000 yuan – about 45,000 US dollars.
The activities of the Chinese organized criminal groups are inflicting “serious harm to the develop0ment of economic ties between the two countries. [Consequently,] the Chinese sides ignoring of facts of crimes threatens to undermine the reputation of Chinese business both in the Russian business community and in the international arena.”
Window on Eurasia: Census Didn’t 'Create' Siberians, Rosstat Head Says on His Blog
Paul Goble
Staunton, April 14 – Whatever some in the media or the population may think, Aleksandr Surinov, the head of the Russian State Statistics Committee says, the recent 2010 census did not create any new nationalities such as the Siberians but only held up a mirror to the identities the residents of the Russian Federation currently have.
Surinov, who has been under intense criticism since his statement that those who identified as Siberians should be allowed to declare that as their nationality and that the census would record that fact, has now posted on his blog (www.a-surinov.livejournal.com) a denial that this has created or promoted such an identity.
The press service of the All-Russian Census has picked that post up in a release entitled “The Census is Not Creating a Nationality” which decries “the incorrect assessment of the list of answers of citizens on the question of [their] nationality” and in particular the supposed “appearance of a new nationality, ‘Siberian’” (globalsib.com/10185/).
The census press service did not reproduce all of Surinov’s arguments, but the Globalsib.com portal has and they are given below:
“Some consider that the 2010 census has made the discovery that the population of Russia has declined. This is very strange since all our assessments of the population over the course of the last eight years have given the very same picture. Some others doubt the results since they were not personally counted. And some are arguing about ‘the Siberians.’”
“About the last question,” Surinov said, “I want to say the following. In the census of the population, Rosstat and all the census takers are OBLIGATED to follow the Constitution and other laws of the Russian Federation. Therefore, in the census forms answers to the question ABOUT NATIONALITY are written down STRICTLY ACCORDING TO THE WORDS of the individual questioned. NO ONE has the right to prompt people for an answer on this point, to show doubts about any answer or to insist on a particular answer. If it were otherwise, and complaints suggest that this happened but rapidly, then we census takers will correct ourselves and do apologize. To assess the actions of people we do not have the right, and this is correct. An individual may not have a single drop of Russian blood but be raised in Russian traditions and Russian culture. And he may call himself a Russian if he wants. Or he can refuse to answer this question.”
“Statistical workers must assemble information, process it, and present it to the user in order that he in the first instance can correctly interpret it. And we shall see how will be interpreted the population of Siberians, Pomors, Russians and others by ethnographers. Science does not stand without moving, and there are many scientific schools. Today may be one interpretation, and tomorrow another. But the main thing is that all users have equal access to information and this means equal opportunities for interpretation.”
“For the conduct of the 2010 census, the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences developed a list of possible variants of answers of the population for coding the answers to the question on the census form about nationality by taking into account the self-designations which appeared during the 2002 census. There were more than 1800 such self-designations. But how many nationalities are there in the Russian Federation?”
“This enumeration is needed exclusively for the machine processing of the materials of the 2010 All-Russian Census and the organization of its results on the question of nationality. Each position in this list has its own code number. In this list, a new self-designation may appear on the basis of the results of the last census. Thus, in the 2010 census appeared the Bulgars.”
“In many countries,” Surinov continued, “questions about nationality are not given. And they live no worse than ours. Rosstat will publish the results about the numbers of individuals counted in the census according to their self-designations. But tables about questions of census forms will be published by nationalities. The algorithms of the transition from self-designation to nationality have been worked out by the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Rosstat does not aspire to do this. This is not our task.”
“Now, preparations for the machine processing of the materials of the census are going at full speed. Soon we will begin to process them. I hope our internal resources will be sufficient and we will put out the results according to our plans. Then we can talk about the Siberians. How many of them there are, where they are, and where they live. About unisex and polygamist marriages. [And] about populations of gnomes, elves, and other curiosities.”
In reporting this blogpost, which itself appears likely to give rise to further debate – although possibly shifting its focus from Rosstat to the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology and its oft-criticized director Valery Tishkov, Globalsib.com also queried experts there and elsewhere about the lists of nationalities.
Officials at the Institute pointed out that the list of names developed by its scholars was “not handed out to the census takers” and is needed, as Surinov said, “only for the processing of materials of the 2010 census and the reporting of results on the nationality composition” and other “demographic and social-economic characteristics of the peoples” of Russia.
Vladimir Zorin, deputy director of the Institute, said that “such a new nationality as ‘Siberians’ could not appear as a result of the census.” Censuses by themselves are not the basis for “creating or destroying a nationality. The task of the census is simply to record accurately the answers, and that is all.”
Meanwhile, however, Leokadia Drobrizheva, the head of the Center for Research on Inter-Ethnic Relations of the Institute of Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences (who earlier worked at the Institute of Ethnology), focused on the causes of the appearance of “the Siberians.”
She suggested that there could be several, including “fear about unification and a seeking to distinguish oneself among others, an expression of protest attitudes, and evidence of the development in Russia of regional identities.” But she too said that “the chance of the appearance of a new nationality as a result of the census was ‘not realistic because there are no objective scientific bases for this.’”
Those who identify as Siberians are unlikely to be satisfied with any of this. Some Siberian activists have already complained to Surinov that many census takers refused to write down their self-designations as Siberians accurately or even insisted that “there are no Siberians” and that census takers have been “prohibited” from writing “Siberian” in the form.
Surinov has dismissed their complains and called on those making them to provide specific instances, but neither his response nor his latest post nor the press release from the census appears likely to calm debate on the issue of Siberian identity and hence on the future meaning of Russianness and of Russia itself.
Staunton, April 14 – Whatever some in the media or the population may think, Aleksandr Surinov, the head of the Russian State Statistics Committee says, the recent 2010 census did not create any new nationalities such as the Siberians but only held up a mirror to the identities the residents of the Russian Federation currently have.
Surinov, who has been under intense criticism since his statement that those who identified as Siberians should be allowed to declare that as their nationality and that the census would record that fact, has now posted on his blog (www.a-surinov.livejournal.com) a denial that this has created or promoted such an identity.
The press service of the All-Russian Census has picked that post up in a release entitled “The Census is Not Creating a Nationality” which decries “the incorrect assessment of the list of answers of citizens on the question of [their] nationality” and in particular the supposed “appearance of a new nationality, ‘Siberian’” (globalsib.com/10185/).
The census press service did not reproduce all of Surinov’s arguments, but the Globalsib.com portal has and they are given below:
“Some consider that the 2010 census has made the discovery that the population of Russia has declined. This is very strange since all our assessments of the population over the course of the last eight years have given the very same picture. Some others doubt the results since they were not personally counted. And some are arguing about ‘the Siberians.’”
“About the last question,” Surinov said, “I want to say the following. In the census of the population, Rosstat and all the census takers are OBLIGATED to follow the Constitution and other laws of the Russian Federation. Therefore, in the census forms answers to the question ABOUT NATIONALITY are written down STRICTLY ACCORDING TO THE WORDS of the individual questioned. NO ONE has the right to prompt people for an answer on this point, to show doubts about any answer or to insist on a particular answer. If it were otherwise, and complaints suggest that this happened but rapidly, then we census takers will correct ourselves and do apologize. To assess the actions of people we do not have the right, and this is correct. An individual may not have a single drop of Russian blood but be raised in Russian traditions and Russian culture. And he may call himself a Russian if he wants. Or he can refuse to answer this question.”
“Statistical workers must assemble information, process it, and present it to the user in order that he in the first instance can correctly interpret it. And we shall see how will be interpreted the population of Siberians, Pomors, Russians and others by ethnographers. Science does not stand without moving, and there are many scientific schools. Today may be one interpretation, and tomorrow another. But the main thing is that all users have equal access to information and this means equal opportunities for interpretation.”
“For the conduct of the 2010 census, the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences developed a list of possible variants of answers of the population for coding the answers to the question on the census form about nationality by taking into account the self-designations which appeared during the 2002 census. There were more than 1800 such self-designations. But how many nationalities are there in the Russian Federation?”
“This enumeration is needed exclusively for the machine processing of the materials of the 2010 All-Russian Census and the organization of its results on the question of nationality. Each position in this list has its own code number. In this list, a new self-designation may appear on the basis of the results of the last census. Thus, in the 2010 census appeared the Bulgars.”
“In many countries,” Surinov continued, “questions about nationality are not given. And they live no worse than ours. Rosstat will publish the results about the numbers of individuals counted in the census according to their self-designations. But tables about questions of census forms will be published by nationalities. The algorithms of the transition from self-designation to nationality have been worked out by the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Rosstat does not aspire to do this. This is not our task.”
“Now, preparations for the machine processing of the materials of the census are going at full speed. Soon we will begin to process them. I hope our internal resources will be sufficient and we will put out the results according to our plans. Then we can talk about the Siberians. How many of them there are, where they are, and where they live. About unisex and polygamist marriages. [And] about populations of gnomes, elves, and other curiosities.”
In reporting this blogpost, which itself appears likely to give rise to further debate – although possibly shifting its focus from Rosstat to the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology and its oft-criticized director Valery Tishkov, Globalsib.com also queried experts there and elsewhere about the lists of nationalities.
Officials at the Institute pointed out that the list of names developed by its scholars was “not handed out to the census takers” and is needed, as Surinov said, “only for the processing of materials of the 2010 census and the reporting of results on the nationality composition” and other “demographic and social-economic characteristics of the peoples” of Russia.
Vladimir Zorin, deputy director of the Institute, said that “such a new nationality as ‘Siberians’ could not appear as a result of the census.” Censuses by themselves are not the basis for “creating or destroying a nationality. The task of the census is simply to record accurately the answers, and that is all.”
Meanwhile, however, Leokadia Drobrizheva, the head of the Center for Research on Inter-Ethnic Relations of the Institute of Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences (who earlier worked at the Institute of Ethnology), focused on the causes of the appearance of “the Siberians.”
She suggested that there could be several, including “fear about unification and a seeking to distinguish oneself among others, an expression of protest attitudes, and evidence of the development in Russia of regional identities.” But she too said that “the chance of the appearance of a new nationality as a result of the census was ‘not realistic because there are no objective scientific bases for this.’”
Those who identify as Siberians are unlikely to be satisfied with any of this. Some Siberian activists have already complained to Surinov that many census takers refused to write down their self-designations as Siberians accurately or even insisted that “there are no Siberians” and that census takers have been “prohibited” from writing “Siberian” in the form.
Surinov has dismissed their complains and called on those making them to provide specific instances, but neither his response nor his latest post nor the press release from the census appears likely to calm debate on the issue of Siberian identity and hence on the future meaning of Russianness and of Russia itself.
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Window on Eurasia: Young Russians Less Tolerant of Non-Russians than are Their Parents, Poll Finds
Paul Goble
Staunton, April 13 – A survey of 1500 Russians conducted by officials Tomsk found that younger people in that city are less tolerant of representatives of other nationalities than are their parents and other older people, according to a press release of the new Children of the Mountains Organization which unites people from the North Caucasus now living in Russia.
Madonna Dunyaeva, the head of the Children of the Mountains group, said that in March, the Tomsk oblast department for youth policy conducted a poll to clarify “the level of tensions in inter-ethnic relations among residents of Tomsk oblast” and that the results have now been released (www.amic.ru/news/146253/).
The survey showed, she said that “young people of Tomsk are less tolerant to representatives of other nationalities than are adults,” with 15 percent of young people agreeing with the statement that “multi-nationality harms Russia,” 33 percent saying they feel “anger” toward non-Russians there, and 43 percent supporting a ban on immigration.
Moreover, Dunyaeva continued, the poll found that “every third declared that he or she had been a witness in recent times to conflicts on an ethnic basis” and one in every five of those young people said they “support those who took part in the [December 11] demonstration in [Moscow’s] Manezh Square.”
All these figures are higher than those found for older Russians, and the head of the Children of the Mountains Organization, said that “it is necessary to establish an educational course, ‘the peoples of Russia,’ in the schools which would acquaint children with the cultures of various peoples. Only by doing so can be defeat the main cause of xenophobia – ignorance.”
She added that it is also “necessary to establish close cooperation between the higher educational institutions and the diasporas [in order to provide] the diasporas with information on arriving students” because it is precisely these diasporas which can quickly and effectively help [these arrivals] adapt to local culture and to learn the [Russian] language.”
Tomsk Governor Viktor Kress said that he supports this idea. “I absolutely agree with Madonna when she says that it is necessary to study the peoples of Russia. We ought to have such a course not only in the schools” but for the broader population.
The Children of the Mountains Youth Organization was established in Tomsk at the end of January and now has branches in various Siberian cities. Its founding document declares that it seeks to promote “the unity of Caucasus young people on the territory of Russia and also love to the traditions of the culture of the Caucasus” (http://deti-gor.com/site/).
The group, which says it is the “first union of its type” in the Russian Federation, includes all ethnic groups from the region, including ethnic Russians, who “want to jointly resolve pressing issues of Caucasus youth and also to preserve the culture and mentality of the Caucasus and the Trans-Caucasus.”
In a related report, Andrey Smirnov, the director of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, said in Baku that one of the reasons that there are inter-ethnic problems in Moscow is that there are very few residents of the Russian capital who are genuine Muscovites (www.islamrf.ru/news/russia/rusnews/15685/).
According to Smirnov, “today fewer than ten percent of the total number of residents of Moscow are indigenous Muscovites, those who have at least one parent who was born and grew up in Moscow.” As a result, Moscow today is “an unstable conglomerate in which there are a large number of migrants.”
“I think,” Smirnov said, reflecting the view of many longstanding residents of the capital, “native Muscovites would never permit themselves” to attack anyone on the basis of religious or ethnic differences. But “of course,” he added, “for today’s Russia, one of the dangers is the disloyalty of certain Russian Muslims.”
Staunton, April 13 – A survey of 1500 Russians conducted by officials Tomsk found that younger people in that city are less tolerant of representatives of other nationalities than are their parents and other older people, according to a press release of the new Children of the Mountains Organization which unites people from the North Caucasus now living in Russia.
Madonna Dunyaeva, the head of the Children of the Mountains group, said that in March, the Tomsk oblast department for youth policy conducted a poll to clarify “the level of tensions in inter-ethnic relations among residents of Tomsk oblast” and that the results have now been released (www.amic.ru/news/146253/).
The survey showed, she said that “young people of Tomsk are less tolerant to representatives of other nationalities than are adults,” with 15 percent of young people agreeing with the statement that “multi-nationality harms Russia,” 33 percent saying they feel “anger” toward non-Russians there, and 43 percent supporting a ban on immigration.
Moreover, Dunyaeva continued, the poll found that “every third declared that he or she had been a witness in recent times to conflicts on an ethnic basis” and one in every five of those young people said they “support those who took part in the [December 11] demonstration in [Moscow’s] Manezh Square.”
All these figures are higher than those found for older Russians, and the head of the Children of the Mountains Organization, said that “it is necessary to establish an educational course, ‘the peoples of Russia,’ in the schools which would acquaint children with the cultures of various peoples. Only by doing so can be defeat the main cause of xenophobia – ignorance.”
She added that it is also “necessary to establish close cooperation between the higher educational institutions and the diasporas [in order to provide] the diasporas with information on arriving students” because it is precisely these diasporas which can quickly and effectively help [these arrivals] adapt to local culture and to learn the [Russian] language.”
Tomsk Governor Viktor Kress said that he supports this idea. “I absolutely agree with Madonna when she says that it is necessary to study the peoples of Russia. We ought to have such a course not only in the schools” but for the broader population.
The Children of the Mountains Youth Organization was established in Tomsk at the end of January and now has branches in various Siberian cities. Its founding document declares that it seeks to promote “the unity of Caucasus young people on the territory of Russia and also love to the traditions of the culture of the Caucasus” (http://deti-gor.com/site/).
The group, which says it is the “first union of its type” in the Russian Federation, includes all ethnic groups from the region, including ethnic Russians, who “want to jointly resolve pressing issues of Caucasus youth and also to preserve the culture and mentality of the Caucasus and the Trans-Caucasus.”
In a related report, Andrey Smirnov, the director of the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, said in Baku that one of the reasons that there are inter-ethnic problems in Moscow is that there are very few residents of the Russian capital who are genuine Muscovites (www.islamrf.ru/news/russia/rusnews/15685/).
According to Smirnov, “today fewer than ten percent of the total number of residents of Moscow are indigenous Muscovites, those who have at least one parent who was born and grew up in Moscow.” As a result, Moscow today is “an unstable conglomerate in which there are a large number of migrants.”
“I think,” Smirnov said, reflecting the view of many longstanding residents of the capital, “native Muscovites would never permit themselves” to attack anyone on the basis of religious or ethnic differences. But “of course,” he added, “for today’s Russia, one of the dangers is the disloyalty of certain Russian Muslims.”
Window on Eurasia: Real Incomes of 40 Percent of Russians have Fallen Since 1991, Studies Find
Paul Goble
Staunton, April 13 – The real incomes of the two least-well-off quintiles of the Russian population have fallen since 1991 while those of that two best-off have risen significantly, dramatically increasing income differentiation and potentially exacerbating class-based tensions, according to two studies by the Higher School of Economics.
“If one considers the overall figures concerning how Russia lived in 1990 and 2009,” Andrey Polunin of “Svobodnaya pressa” says in reporting on these studies, “it turns out that citizens have only won as a result of reforms. Thus, consumption has gone up overall 1.45 times. But this is like an average temperature in a hospital” (svpressa.ru/politic/article/41896/).
That is the trend Moscow and its supporters normally report, but if one unpacks the figures as the Higher School of Economics experts do in two reports (“The Level and Way of Life of the Population in 1989-2009” and “A Comparative Analysis of Consumption and Expenditures”), Polunin says, the picture is far more complicated and less positive.
The bottom 40 percent of the population has fallen behind over this period, he reports. The level of real incomes for the lowest 20 percent has fallen 1.45 times and the next lowest quintile by 1.2 times. At the other end, the top 20 percent have seen their incomes double, and the next highest quintile had their incomes go up a quarter.
This change in the distribution of real incomes has hit the least-well-off groups especially hard because of the decline in state support for housing, education and especially medicine, with the lower quintiles forced to spend a higher proportion of their incomes for all these things or do without them, the studies found.
The situation in medicine is particularly striking, Polunin observes. In the European Union, for example, individuals directly bear 24 percent of the cost of medical treatment while in Russia that figure is now 40 to 50 percent, a dramatically higher fraction than only twenty years ago.
And this increase is hitting Russians, especially those least well off, because the average rate of illness among Russians rose 43 percent per 100,000 population over the period 1990 to 2008 and because many of the illnesses involved, such as cancer and heart disease, are particularly expensive to treat.
But the most striking findings of the report concern income differentiation, Polunin suggests. “In Soviet times, the earnings of a worker (120 rubles a month), an engineer (180 rubles a month), and a colonel in the KGB (350 rubles a month) of course were different, but not by ten times as much as is the case today.”
The Soviet system’s commitment to wage equality “froze the development of the economy,” the report says, “but still more abnormal has been the gigantic growth in inequality which the establishment of the market economy has involved.” In Russia, it has been especially severe, eight times more rapid than in Hungary and five times more than in the Czech Republic.
The reports of the Higher Economic School nonetheless generally stress the positive aspects of the changes, something that is not surprising given the liberal views of most of those working there. But they do acknowledge that for many of the poorest in Russia today, the Soviet past does not look altogether bleak.
The reports note, for example, that “Soviet people strictly speaking did not suffer impoverishment. In the USSR [at least at the end of the Soviet period] there was no hunger, the population was guaranteed state services for health and education, often not of bad quality, and practically free housing. Besides, in the USSR there was no unemployment.”
“On the other hand,” the reports say, “there were shortages of practically all consumer goods and those available were not of high quality as a result of the absence of competition.” These conclusions prompted the “Svobodnaya pressa” journalist to ask three people whether people lived better “in the same of the USSR or now.”
Yevgeny Yasin, a former Russian economics minister and one of the senior scholars at the institution which prepared the reports said that “it is incomparable better to live now,” but he acknowledged that was true only for those near the top of the income pyramid and said that if he were had the bottom, he “would certainly have a totally different impression.”
He added that the government should address the consequences of income inequality not only as a matter of justice, something the reports did not address but to ensure propitious macro-economic conditions. Just raising pay will not be enough; productivity must be increased as well, Yasin said.
Aleksey Mukhin, general director of the Moscow Center of Political Information, in contrast, said that “of course, it was easier to live in the middle 1980s. Life was predictable,” although he acknowledged that after 1991, there appeared “greater possibilities for the realization of creative potential.”
But not surprisingly, Oleg Kulikov, a KPRF Duma deputy, argued that “of course, people lived better in Soviet times. Today, life expectancy compared with the Soviet past has fallen by more than ten years,” as has the birthrate, which reflects the fact that people have children only when they have “confidence in the future.”
Kulikov adds, “it is possible to say that now the people are voting for the USSR by their premature departure from life and their decisions not to have children. Moreover, Soviet times lacked many of the features of today: inter-ethnic conflicts, poverty, and bums on the streets,” all developments that make the past look better.
Moreover, he says, “we were certain that the difficulties which did exist were temporary and that the situation would improve. There was hope that this great country could deal with them.” Now, ordinary people do not have that experience or that feeling, he said, and they are understandably upset.
Staunton, April 13 – The real incomes of the two least-well-off quintiles of the Russian population have fallen since 1991 while those of that two best-off have risen significantly, dramatically increasing income differentiation and potentially exacerbating class-based tensions, according to two studies by the Higher School of Economics.
“If one considers the overall figures concerning how Russia lived in 1990 and 2009,” Andrey Polunin of “Svobodnaya pressa” says in reporting on these studies, “it turns out that citizens have only won as a result of reforms. Thus, consumption has gone up overall 1.45 times. But this is like an average temperature in a hospital” (svpressa.ru/politic/article/41896/).
That is the trend Moscow and its supporters normally report, but if one unpacks the figures as the Higher School of Economics experts do in two reports (“The Level and Way of Life of the Population in 1989-2009” and “A Comparative Analysis of Consumption and Expenditures”), Polunin says, the picture is far more complicated and less positive.
The bottom 40 percent of the population has fallen behind over this period, he reports. The level of real incomes for the lowest 20 percent has fallen 1.45 times and the next lowest quintile by 1.2 times. At the other end, the top 20 percent have seen their incomes double, and the next highest quintile had their incomes go up a quarter.
This change in the distribution of real incomes has hit the least-well-off groups especially hard because of the decline in state support for housing, education and especially medicine, with the lower quintiles forced to spend a higher proportion of their incomes for all these things or do without them, the studies found.
The situation in medicine is particularly striking, Polunin observes. In the European Union, for example, individuals directly bear 24 percent of the cost of medical treatment while in Russia that figure is now 40 to 50 percent, a dramatically higher fraction than only twenty years ago.
And this increase is hitting Russians, especially those least well off, because the average rate of illness among Russians rose 43 percent per 100,000 population over the period 1990 to 2008 and because many of the illnesses involved, such as cancer and heart disease, are particularly expensive to treat.
But the most striking findings of the report concern income differentiation, Polunin suggests. “In Soviet times, the earnings of a worker (120 rubles a month), an engineer (180 rubles a month), and a colonel in the KGB (350 rubles a month) of course were different, but not by ten times as much as is the case today.”
The Soviet system’s commitment to wage equality “froze the development of the economy,” the report says, “but still more abnormal has been the gigantic growth in inequality which the establishment of the market economy has involved.” In Russia, it has been especially severe, eight times more rapid than in Hungary and five times more than in the Czech Republic.
The reports of the Higher Economic School nonetheless generally stress the positive aspects of the changes, something that is not surprising given the liberal views of most of those working there. But they do acknowledge that for many of the poorest in Russia today, the Soviet past does not look altogether bleak.
The reports note, for example, that “Soviet people strictly speaking did not suffer impoverishment. In the USSR [at least at the end of the Soviet period] there was no hunger, the population was guaranteed state services for health and education, often not of bad quality, and practically free housing. Besides, in the USSR there was no unemployment.”
“On the other hand,” the reports say, “there were shortages of practically all consumer goods and those available were not of high quality as a result of the absence of competition.” These conclusions prompted the “Svobodnaya pressa” journalist to ask three people whether people lived better “in the same of the USSR or now.”
Yevgeny Yasin, a former Russian economics minister and one of the senior scholars at the institution which prepared the reports said that “it is incomparable better to live now,” but he acknowledged that was true only for those near the top of the income pyramid and said that if he were had the bottom, he “would certainly have a totally different impression.”
He added that the government should address the consequences of income inequality not only as a matter of justice, something the reports did not address but to ensure propitious macro-economic conditions. Just raising pay will not be enough; productivity must be increased as well, Yasin said.
Aleksey Mukhin, general director of the Moscow Center of Political Information, in contrast, said that “of course, it was easier to live in the middle 1980s. Life was predictable,” although he acknowledged that after 1991, there appeared “greater possibilities for the realization of creative potential.”
But not surprisingly, Oleg Kulikov, a KPRF Duma deputy, argued that “of course, people lived better in Soviet times. Today, life expectancy compared with the Soviet past has fallen by more than ten years,” as has the birthrate, which reflects the fact that people have children only when they have “confidence in the future.”
Kulikov adds, “it is possible to say that now the people are voting for the USSR by their premature departure from life and their decisions not to have children. Moreover, Soviet times lacked many of the features of today: inter-ethnic conflicts, poverty, and bums on the streets,” all developments that make the past look better.
Moreover, he says, “we were certain that the difficulties which did exist were temporary and that the situation would improve. There was hope that this great country could deal with them.” Now, ordinary people do not have that experience or that feeling, he said, and they are understandably upset.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Window on Eurasia: Abkhaz Leader’s Visit to Turkey Poses Challenges for Ankara and Moscow, Markedonov Says
Paul Goble
Staunton, April 12 – The just-completed visit to Turkey by Abkhaz President Sergey Bagapsh represents both a problem and an opportunity for Ankara and Moscow, involving as it does many issues far beyond the question of broader international recognition for that breakaway republic, according to a leading Russian expert on the region.
In an essay carried by the “Novaya politika” portal yesterday, Sergey Markedonov argues that Bagapsh’s April 7-10 visit to Turkey must be put in this broader context rather than seen as only an effort to achieve a diplomatic breakthrough for a country that is only “partially recognized” (novopol.ru/-turetskiy-voyaj-sergeya-bagapsha-text99510.html).
Ankara both through its embassy in Tbilisi and its foreign ministry have made clear that Bagapsh’s visit does not represent a change in Turkish policy and that Turkey “does not intend to recognize Abkhazia as an independent state.” Indeed, the Turkish foreign office said it continues to view Georgia as “a strategic partner,” something that recognizing Sukhumi would destroy.
As Markedonov points out, Bagapsh was the guest in Turkey not of the government but of the Federation of Abkhaz Associations and the Federation of Caucasus Associations, two umbrella groups which unite many of the large Caucasian diasporas living in the Turkish Republic.
As Turkish Foreign Minister Akhmet Davitoglu said in September 2009, Markedonov continues, Ankara “does want to become acquainted with Abkhazia and seek to regularize its relations with Georgia,” a statement that is part of the reason why many now call him “the Turkish Kissinger.”
Markedonov suggests that no one should see Ankara’s stance as “altruistic.” Instead, it reflects Turkey’s longstanding desire to “have contacts with all the players,” not only because it wants to exert its influence in the Caucasus more than in the past but also because of the large Caucasian diasporas in Turkey itself.
Such people, the Russian analyst continues are “voters” but “not only that.” Among them are “military men and employees of the special services and experts and journalists.” Consequently, “from a pragmatic point of view, it is wrong to ignore their positions.” And thus any effort to block the Abkhaz leader’s visit could have serious negative consequences at home.
But, Markedonov continues, this is precisely the reason why “Ankara is not recognizing the independence of Abkhazia.” That would create the kind of “precedent of ethnic self-determination” that it opposes. If it acted differently, then “representatives of the Circassian, Chechen and Crimean Tatar diasporas could demand” similar treatment from Ankara.
Moreover, if Turkey recognized Abkhazia, it would find itself at odds with Moscow, Kyiv and its partners in NATO and the European Union. “Striving to enter ‘a single Europe’ is also as strong as the desire not to allow the use of an Abkhaz precedent by Kurdish separatists” in Turkey itself, Markedonov points out.
At the same time, however, “Turkey is in a position to broaden ‘the Abkhaz window’ and to force Tbilisi to be more correct in issues concerning the detention of Turkish ships and in general in the struggle with ‘Turkish contraband,’ as the actions of Turkish sailors in Abkhaz waters are described officially by Georgia.”
Abkhazia and Bagapsh personally benefited from the visit, given the centrality of the diaspora in the thinking of Abkhazian leaders. But at the same time, the visit may complicate the relationship of this breakaway government with its Moscow sponsors who may not be entirely pleased to see Abkhazia behaving so independently.
That is at least in part because Moscow, after the events of August 2008, had won greater support among many of the North Caucasus diasporas in Turkey, some of whose leaders have refused to support calls to declare the events of 1864 a genocide or to take part in Circassian efforts to block the Sochi Olympics.
But however that may be, Markedonov concludes, “on the eve of the Sochi Olympiad [scheduled for 2014], the ‘Circassian quesiton’ is becoming extremely important.” Consequently, establishing “constructive relations with the Caucasus diasporas of Turkey with Abkhazia’s help could be an extremely important task for Moscow.”
Staunton, April 12 – The just-completed visit to Turkey by Abkhaz President Sergey Bagapsh represents both a problem and an opportunity for Ankara and Moscow, involving as it does many issues far beyond the question of broader international recognition for that breakaway republic, according to a leading Russian expert on the region.
In an essay carried by the “Novaya politika” portal yesterday, Sergey Markedonov argues that Bagapsh’s April 7-10 visit to Turkey must be put in this broader context rather than seen as only an effort to achieve a diplomatic breakthrough for a country that is only “partially recognized” (novopol.ru/-turetskiy-voyaj-sergeya-bagapsha-text99510.html).
Ankara both through its embassy in Tbilisi and its foreign ministry have made clear that Bagapsh’s visit does not represent a change in Turkish policy and that Turkey “does not intend to recognize Abkhazia as an independent state.” Indeed, the Turkish foreign office said it continues to view Georgia as “a strategic partner,” something that recognizing Sukhumi would destroy.
As Markedonov points out, Bagapsh was the guest in Turkey not of the government but of the Federation of Abkhaz Associations and the Federation of Caucasus Associations, two umbrella groups which unite many of the large Caucasian diasporas living in the Turkish Republic.
As Turkish Foreign Minister Akhmet Davitoglu said in September 2009, Markedonov continues, Ankara “does want to become acquainted with Abkhazia and seek to regularize its relations with Georgia,” a statement that is part of the reason why many now call him “the Turkish Kissinger.”
Markedonov suggests that no one should see Ankara’s stance as “altruistic.” Instead, it reflects Turkey’s longstanding desire to “have contacts with all the players,” not only because it wants to exert its influence in the Caucasus more than in the past but also because of the large Caucasian diasporas in Turkey itself.
Such people, the Russian analyst continues are “voters” but “not only that.” Among them are “military men and employees of the special services and experts and journalists.” Consequently, “from a pragmatic point of view, it is wrong to ignore their positions.” And thus any effort to block the Abkhaz leader’s visit could have serious negative consequences at home.
But, Markedonov continues, this is precisely the reason why “Ankara is not recognizing the independence of Abkhazia.” That would create the kind of “precedent of ethnic self-determination” that it opposes. If it acted differently, then “representatives of the Circassian, Chechen and Crimean Tatar diasporas could demand” similar treatment from Ankara.
Moreover, if Turkey recognized Abkhazia, it would find itself at odds with Moscow, Kyiv and its partners in NATO and the European Union. “Striving to enter ‘a single Europe’ is also as strong as the desire not to allow the use of an Abkhaz precedent by Kurdish separatists” in Turkey itself, Markedonov points out.
At the same time, however, “Turkey is in a position to broaden ‘the Abkhaz window’ and to force Tbilisi to be more correct in issues concerning the detention of Turkish ships and in general in the struggle with ‘Turkish contraband,’ as the actions of Turkish sailors in Abkhaz waters are described officially by Georgia.”
Abkhazia and Bagapsh personally benefited from the visit, given the centrality of the diaspora in the thinking of Abkhazian leaders. But at the same time, the visit may complicate the relationship of this breakaway government with its Moscow sponsors who may not be entirely pleased to see Abkhazia behaving so independently.
That is at least in part because Moscow, after the events of August 2008, had won greater support among many of the North Caucasus diasporas in Turkey, some of whose leaders have refused to support calls to declare the events of 1864 a genocide or to take part in Circassian efforts to block the Sochi Olympics.
But however that may be, Markedonov concludes, “on the eve of the Sochi Olympiad [scheduled for 2014], the ‘Circassian quesiton’ is becoming extremely important.” Consequently, establishing “constructive relations with the Caucasus diasporas of Turkey with Abkhazia’s help could be an extremely important task for Moscow.”
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