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English Language Page Problems associated with ethnic integration, which became more aggravating when V. Putin assumed the presidency of the Russian Federation, did not disappear during 2001. The rights of most ethnic minorities living in Russia continued to be transgressed, with violations often growing into sustained discrimination. Just as in previous years, particularly alarming reports came out of the areas of small indigenous communities in the north and the Chechens in the south. Notably, the number of ethnic Russians has grown in post-Soviet Russia and Russian culture has been preferentially promulgated. The result is that ethnic minorities are being passively Russified, which is a violation of the principle of “the multi-national character of the Russian State,” as stated in the Constitution of the Russian Federation. Though the reform launched by President Putin to restructure the government has meaningfully slowed down in 2001, his goal to build a single vertical structure of power continues to come closer to realization. One of the measures taken to achieve his aim has been the elimination of the Ministry for Federation Affairs, which had been responsible for federation-building, migration and ethnic policies. A single Minister for Ethnic Policies (without portfolio), V. Zorin, who was one of the principal federal government agents in the last Chechen war, replaced the whole governmental agency. In his interview to the Kommersant daily (1), V. Zorin said that “…elimination of the ministry was part of a new course aimed to give society a new quality, by bolstering vertical power, creating a single legal arena, and increasing federal districts.” However, though the Administration of the President and presidential representatives in the federal districts had been primarily involved in election campaigns in the Russian ethnic republics, no major devolution of power from the elected regional heads to the appointed presidential agents had ever occurred. Specifically, the scary predictions that Russian nationalism would be on the rise and new hurdles would emerge in the path of Russia-based ethnic republics and communities seeking to pursue unimpeded development did not materialize last year. The State Duma continued to debate allowing the Russian people to enjoy a special “nation-building” status and having Russia assume primary responsibility for ethnic Russians living in the former Soviet republics. Passage of the draft laws “On the Russian People” and “On the Official Status of the Russian Language” was actively pushed. Those bills held a number of provisions aimed at allowing the Russian people to enjoy a special status within the state. Deputies from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (KPRF) and Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) have repeatedly taken the podium with their sharp nationalistic, xenophobic and Anti-Semitic pronouncements at a number of parliamentary hearings. In the meantime, the State Duma is currently debating the bill “On the Guidelines for Official Ethnic Policies,” which is supported by most of the domestic ethnic regions and backed on a number of points by the liberal Duma members. To be in accordance with the Federal Constitution, the bill defines Russia as a multi-ethnic country, with all of its ethnic communities being “nation-builders.” The official ethnic policy ought to aim to assure “economic, social, political and legal safeguards for Russia’s ethnic minorities,” according to the aforementioned bill. The Government of the Russian Federation submitted to the State Duma the bill “On Introducing Changes and Amendments to Federal Law “On Ethno- Cultural Autonomy.” This bill, if passed into law, would generally improve the living and work opportunities for ethnic communities and specifically define an ethno-cultural autonomy as “a form of ethnic and cultural self-determination, a public association of citizens of the Russian Federation affiliating themselves with a certain ethnic community and posing as an ethnic minority within a given administrative unit.” To summarize, the involvement of the Council of Federation of the RF Federal Assembly — the federal representative body for Russian regions — in the area of ethnic progress and ethnic relations has been less visible than in the previous years. The so-called “anti-terrorist operation,” in fact a military campaign, in the Chechen Republic conducted by the Russian government against the fighters for Chechnya’s independence has degenerated into a series of open actions, accompanied by indiscriminate killings, to intimidate the Chechen population. The troops deployed in Chechnya have increasingly viewed the locals as “beasts” worthy of no humane treatment, according to numerous eyewitness and human rights defenders’ reports. Concurrently, the government has been doing its best to conceal the massive grass-roots character of the ongoing conflict. What is more, the state-run and private Russian-language media, which under normal conditions seek to carefully avoid excessive mention of the country’s federal makeup, would refer to the troops operating in Chechnya as “federal” rather than “Russian.” As compared to the second Chechen war of 1999–2000, the proportion of news reports on the Russian Orthodox Church activities in the deployed garrisons and Chechnya as a whole, as well as on the hardships of the remaining Russians in the region, has been significantly decreased (2). The Krasnodar territory, the Volgograd region, and many other Russian regions engaged their law enforcement agencies to evict local Roma and carry out a sequence of clearly nationalistic measures against the Chechen diaspora. In addition, in a number of other Russian territories and regions nationalistic Cossack groups receive substantial governmental support. Notably, the Cossacks in southern Russia even took on the role of “safeguarding order.” In the meantime, following a series of pogroms and assaults staged by nationalists, the domestic special services and regional authorities undertook measures aimed at breaking up extremist nationalistic organizations. The Russian National Unity (RNE), a high-profile nationalistic organization, has effectively ceased to exist as a national Russia-wide political force, and most of its regional chapters’ activities are now being monitored by special services. Following last year’s pogroms at the capital’s Yasenevo and Tzaritsino marketplaces, the Moscow authorities have for the first time displayed their readiness to counter the more aggressive nationalistic groups. Admittedly, only a few of the active participants of those tragic events have been prosecuted so far. In nearly all Russian regions, the Russian Orthodox Church — Moscow Patriarchy — holds a dominant position over other confessions, receiving the most financial support from local authorities and having the most influence on official religious (and often cultural and educational) policies, according to the latest findings of regional monitors. A number of the Russian Orthodox Church officials and some Russian Orthodox media continued to push nationalistic and Anti-Semitic propaganda. On the other hand, the RF President and central authorities have repeatedly been outspoken in support of not only the Russian Orthodox Church but also of other Russian “traditional” religions, which served to radically diminishing nationalistic and chauvinistic ferocity of the Russian Orthodox rhetoric. Russification and Federalism The year 2001 saw the continuation of the Moscow-launched regional legislation effort aimed at repossessing the local natural resources that provide an economic basis to the sovereignty of ethnic administrative units. The statutory preemptive rights of smaller indigenous ethnic communities to the local natural resources and unmodified habitats have largely been wishful thinking. However, in government politics, rather than in economics, ethnic relations have obviously come to the forefront. Clearly, though many politicians make use of nationalistic ideas simply to meet their personal power ambitions, members of the Russian and ethnic elites, for the most part, continue to be compelled to stand up for the interests of their relevant groups. In this political struggle, it is important to make best use of available administrative resources in order to either back Russification or oppose it. The principal argument here could be a hypothetical opportunity to use a given ethnic language on par with Russian when tackling matters of public life and government service. To provide an example to this effect, in his article “Russia and Russians” A. Sevastyanov, one of the drafters of the State Duma bill “On the Official Status of the Russian Language (3),” was outraged by the mere possibility of some resident of the Republic of Tyva sending a Russian-language application to a non-Russian-speaking local government official. According to A. Sevastyanov, this would be in violation of the right “to appeal in person or send in either individual or collective petitions to central government agencies or local administrations” guaranteed by Article 33 of the RF Constitution. His opponent Kaadyr-ool Bichedey maintained that the knowledge of Russian made a “sufficient,” though not “mandatory,” requirement for candidates seeking a public office within the republic. The republican-level attempts undertaken in 2001 to legally counter the Russification trend and expand the use of ethnic languages had for the most part ended in failure. Local Russians across the country have been reluctant to learn the ethnic languages. As a consequence, the relevant republican laws had to drop those provisions that indicated that the knowledge of the local language recommended or required for holding a public office. Notably, local laws stipulate that the knowledge of Russian is necessary for the established official functions (like record keeping) to be performed and nearly mandatory for career growth. The Republic of Mordovia failed to secure passage of Republican Law “On Languages” that was drafted to give incentive to prospective public office holders to study the Mordovan language. In December 2000, when the Republic of Karelia had its draft Constitution debated, local lawmakers dropped the provision requiring that the Karelian language be adopted as the second official language. However, the Adyg Republic managed to pass the law allowing for the use of the Adyg language, along with the Russian language, to maintain record-keeping tasks starting in 2003, notwithstanding a focused media campaign to the contrary. The Vakhitovsky district court of Kazan (Republic of Tatarstan) adjudicated a suit filed by a local resident, S. Khapugin, against the Tatarstan Ministry of Education. The republic’s public schools teaching the Tatar language had been challenged in a court of law for the first time. The core issue is that S. Khapugin, father of a third-grader enrolled in the Kazan public school ¹49, contends that too many hours of classroom time (six hours a week) are being designated for the Tatar language. “Making the Tatar Language and Literature a compulsory subject equal with the Russian Language and Literature at any and all public schools in the republic is a violation of my son’s legitimate rights and interests,” writes the plaintiff in his legal action. Given that the Tatar language is rarely used in the home, in official papers, or in the general or higher schools of learning, the government ruling to teach the Tatar language on a compulsory basis appears to be out of line with “the realities of the day,” according to S. Khapugin. In his application, he asks to nullify the public school curriculum that mandates assigning to the teaching of the Tartar language the same amount of time as to the teaching of the Russian language. The Vakhitovsky district court ruled against S. Khapugin and in favor of the prosecutor, who argued that the curriculum is based on provisions of the Constitutions of the Republic of Tatarstan and the Russian Federation, as well as on federal and republican laws on education and official languages. However, according to some trial participants, “some of the republic’s residents are not certain they are going to need the Tatar language to perform their everyday tasks. The language has rarely been used in either regional governmental agencies or other organizations despite the fact that Tatar, indeed, has been ruled as an official language within the republic (4).” Ethnic Russians living in Bashkortostan have voiced nearly the same degree of outrage and resentment at having their children taught the local languages. The Russian-language public schools with a multi-ethnic mix of students have the “native languages” taught in small groups (Bashkir, Tatar, Chuvash, Marii, etc.) to cater to the students’ interests, according to the curriculum for public schools of the Republic of Bashkortostan (annually printed in the Teacher of Bashkortostan journal). The Russian-speaking students are free either to learn Russian in depth or master the Bashkir language. The last regional human rights report on Bashkortostan states that the local Russian-speaking students have, as a matter of fact, been indirectly coerced into studying Bashkir as their native language because they have never been advised of their choice of languages for study. If parents attempt to assure that their children study Russian as their native language, their request is either denied, using various pretexts (lack of Russian teachers, the class hours being already distributed, shortage of training aids, or some other deficiency) or they are threatened that their children will have a difficult time enrolling in any school of higher learning in Bashkortostan unless they have a good command of the Bashkir language. To illustrate the above, in September 1999, a group of Russian-speaking parents were told that their children would have to study Bashkir as their native language, without being given any information regarding a choice in the matter. Twelve parents of first graders in the Tyumazy-based high school ¹2 turned to M. Sageev, school principal, with a request to attempt to resolve the issue by taking into account the parents’ preferences. M. Sageev turned down their petition, referring to his being unable to restructure the curriculum in the middle of an academic year. However, he promised that the parents’ wishes would be honored next year. In 2000, M. Sageev refused to accept the parents’ petition, stating that all residents of Bashkortostan have to master the Bashkir language. Following that twist of events, the parents first turned to the city public education department and then appealed to the Ministry of Public Education of the Republic of Bashkortostan, where they were advised that disputes related to curriculum were the competency of the school principal. It is only after they turned to S. Kirienko, presidential representative in the Trans-Volga federal district, that (beginning September 24, 2001) their children, third graders by then, were eventually allowed to learn Russian as their native language. To emphasize, the local Russian-speaking schools have all other subjects taught in the Russian language. While problems related to the Russian language in ethnic republics have largely been in the domain of public education, the use of ethnic languages, including those of titular ethnic communities, has been problematic in many realms. Usage of the Komi language, for example, has been radically curtailed and even associated with unpleasant consequences, according to the latest regional report for Komi, in the Komi Republic, where the relevant republican law has proclaimed both Russian and Komi as the official languages. During a June 5, 2000 staff meeting of the Kortkerossky House of Pioneers, everybody present had a good command of Komi, but I. Dalshchikov, head of the public education department of the Kortkerossky district, tried to stop the House of Pioneers employee L. Koroleva from making her remarks in the Komi language. On September 13, 2001, at a similar gathering, I. Dalshchikov joined forces with the House of Pioneers manager, A. Porodnya, and threatened to leave L. Koroleva without a pay raise should the latter persist with her attempts to publicly speak in Komi. L. Koroleva’s filed a suit with the Kortkerossky district court, which ruled against her. L. Koroleva contested that I. Dolshchikov actions, barring employees from making their remarks in Komi, are unlawful. On December 17, 2001, the Supreme Court of the Republic of Komi ruled against L. Koroleva’s, failing to see that I. Dolshchikov’s moves had been unlawful. These same observations could also apply to the use of the Nenets language in the Republic of Komi. The city of Vorkuta, for example, maintains a nursery-boarding school for the children of local reindeer breeders that lead a nomadic lifestyle in the northern reaches of the republic. While the children do not speak Russian, their chaperons do not know a single word of Nenets. The only Nenets-speaking teacher was fired by authorities for being too outspoken in support of his mother tongue. The situation in the Aginsky Buryatsky autonomous district seems to be no different. There, members of the titular ethnic community are the majority of the local populace, which is a rare phenomenon in the RF autonomous districts. However, public school classes and work force gatherings have been conducted exclusively in Russian, with the Buryat language yet to be implemented. Just as in the case of other ethnic regions of Russia, the more socially active Buryat suggest that the requirement for leaders of those subjects of the Russian Federation to have practical knowledge of the titular ethnic community’s language (passed unconstitutional a few years ago) should be restored. Another cause for conflicts between the central government and regional republics within the Russian Federation has been the decision for all Russian citizens to receive a new domestic passport. The Soviet-vintage passports, issued by the former union and autonomous republics, regions and districts, had the Russian-language entries partially translated into the local languages. For example, the first few pages of a passport issued by the Checheno-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR) contained entries in the Russian, Chechen and Ingush languages, the holder’s ethnic origin making no difference. Following the fragmentation of the USSR, those passports were at first used as ID, to confirm the holder’s “republican citizenship” within the Russian Federation. To emphasize, the republican authorities and ethnic organizations in Tatarstan, Bashkortostan, Adygea and other ethnic subjects of the Russian Federation insisted that the new Russian domestic passport should feature additional entries in local languages, as well as carry, wherever necessary, a mention of his/her ethnic identity and republican symbols. Detractors of the new ID maintained that some of the ethnic names could not be appropriately rendered with the use of the Russian letters. What is more, the new passport lacking the “ethnicity” line-item effectively leaves a Russian citizen devoid of the right to have his/her ethnic identity appropriately registered. As a matter of fact, the introduction of the new domestic passport for all citizens of the Russian Federation results in the heads of ethnic republics being unable to apply administrative strategies to counter the ongoing Russification drive. Four years after the new passport was introduced and following a change of four federal Cabinets, Tatarstan and Bashkortostan at long last (in 2001) assured that the eligible local residents be issued Russian passports holding special inserts. Specifically, the ethnic republic-origin passports have their page 4 followed by two no-number pages featuring the coat of arms of the given republic and the holder’s data in the local language. The “ethnicity” information is not listed. Though one’s ethnic identity is not in the passport, it can still be entered into the birth certificate when its holder reaches 16 years of age. Importantly, Russians residing in ethnic republics are free to choose to have their passports either with or without the inserted pages. As it has often been the case, the compromise-approach has failed to please everybody. One major problem is that the new Russian passport appears to have separated Tartars into the following two categories: fully capable Tartars with the right to have their names in their native language and the incapable ones (those residing outside Tatarstan) that have no such right, according to D. Iskhakov, ethnologist and historian, one of the leading ideologists of the Tartar National Center: What can one say of the quality of democracy in a country that leaves its citizens unable to have their names recorded properly? It is impossible write many Tartar names with the use of Cyrillic letters without causing heavy distortions. Ethnic rights (the right to have one’s name correctly recorded, certainly being one of those) are violated as a consequence. Other passport-related questions also continue to be hotly debated. For example, is it really proper for a Muslim to carry an ID on which Christian symbols are used? Why should Tartars be compelled to have their patronymics recorded in their passport? This custom is totally alien to Tartars, who use their own conventions. In making us put down our patronymics in the passports, the authorities effectively Russify us against our will (5). Notably, D. Iskhakov’s mentioning the issue of the Tartar language being dependent on the Cyrillic alphabet was in no way accidental. In 1991, Tatarstan passed a law for the Cyrillic alphabet to be replaced by the Latin alphabet within ten years. The Latin alphabet is believed to be adequately reflective of Turkic phonetics and allows Tartars to more closely approximate the languages use by Turks worldwide. Initially, the Tartars had used the Arabic alphabet but after the 1917 October Revolution in Russia they began to use the Latin alphabet. In 1930, the language changed to using the Cyrillic alphabet, as did many other ethnic languages in the former Soviet Union. The federal authorities had been most wary of the preparations launched by Tatarstan in the fall of 2001 to change to the Latin alphabet. The media carried reports of the difficulties encountered by local residents as they came to see unreadable street names in the very center of Kazan. Television reporters would especially seek to capture the street names in Latin letters, with the duplicative names in Cyrillic writing being left out of the picture. On September 18, 2001, a large group of the pro-government “Unity” (“Edinstvo”) faction in the State Duma, along with numerous members from other factions, submitted a bill prescribing all the RF ethnic republics to exclusively use the Cyrillic alphabet (6). According to this bill, in particular, the following insertion should be made into Federal Law “On the Languages of Ethnic Communities in the Russian Federation”: The official language of the Russian Federation and official languages of republics of the Russian Federation shall use the Cyrillic-based alphabets (letters of the Russian alphabet). Any other guidelines (or coding) for writing the letters (signs or symbols) of the alphabets maintained by ethnic republics in the Russian Federation can be established by relevant federal laws. The bill was drafted by K. Bicheldey, deputy head of the State Duma Committee for the Affairs of Ethnic Communities and head of the working group that drafted Federal Law “On the Official Status of the Russian Language.” The /Eastern Express newspaper (7) carried additional information on how this bill had been drafted. In his interview, the State Duma Deputy F. Safiullin (from Tatarstan) argued that: The bill had been written by the Presidential Administration advisors. The document had been brought to the State Duma by D. Panin, who arranged for the motion to be appropriately backed by a number of Duma members from different ethnic republics… Should the bill pass, the Tartars would see it as a Russian decision to bar the Tartars from tackling this question independently, rather than as a Duma ruling/ While being troubled by Tatarstan seeking to change to the “new-old” alphabet, the central government chose to put pressure on the authorities of other subjects of the Russian Federation, the latter for the most part confirming that the local Tartar public schools (outside Tatarstan) would not change to the Latin alphabet. A group of high-profile Tartar-origin personalities dispatched an open letter to the State Council of the Republic of Tatarstan to suggest that the idea of changing to the Latin alphabet should be abandoned. The writers argued that: A third change of the Tartar alphabet in the last 70 years is alarming, indeed. As we continue to live and work outside Tatarstan, our youngsters would grow-up estranged from our modern ethnic culture, from current activities pursued by the Tartars living in their homeland, as well as from the print information in our native language. Endangered are the literacy and educational standards of the younger generation, access to the national body of fiction and specialized knowledge, and research pursuits. Academician I. Tagirov, poet R. Valeev and playwright T. Minnullin — members of the State Council of the Republic of Tatarstan — held a press conference to make their assessment of the aforementioned letter public. Firstly, “the letter is a document drafted by the presidential administration and backed by a handful of hired individuals, not a desperate appeal from intellectuals concerned about the future of the Tartar language,” according to the press conference speakers. They also maintained that: The letter came to local Tartar communities with the attached list of persons that were supposed to affix their signatures. Many of those individuals that had been picked by Moscow to appear as drafters of the letter refused to sign the document, and some of the signatures turned out to be fake. By way of example, the signature of R. Khamidullin, President of the Council of Elders, was on the appeal, though he had never even read the letter. Secondly, particularly troubling has been the fact that about 80% of those who signed are reported to have either no or very little knowledge of the Tartar language. As a consequence, the Tatarstan authorities chose to slow down the move to change the alphabet in the hope that the excessive passions over the matter would phase out on their own. While the language, culture, traditions and customs of the Tartars (Russia’s second-largest ethnic community) continue to be preserved and developed, with the republican authorities being truly concerned about the community’s growth, the situation found in other ethnic republics appear to be much worse. It would be in order at this juncture to make note of the Finnish reporter M. Pakkonen, whose assessment of the human rights situation in the Marii El Republic was included in the regional human rights report for the year 2001. His article “Marii People Being Cornered” in the Finnish newspaper Helsinki Sanonmat was reprinted by the republican daily Dobriye Sosedi (8). The material contains M. Pakkonen’s impressions of his visit to Marii El: With L. Markelov from LDPR being elected President of Marii El one year ago, the newly formed administration has been pursuing a policy directed against the indigenous people. Over the past year, the ministry of education’s department responsible for writing Marii-language training programs has been eliminated, and the Marii language (proclaimed by the local constitution to be an official language in the republic) has been downgraded into an optional subject in the public school curriculum. What is more, the Marii El government has ceased any effort to back up the Marii culture and had over 80 ethnic Marii people sacked from republican agencies. As they proceed to take advantage of available administrative resources in order to preserve their native languages and cultures, the governments of Russian-based ethnic republics have been exerting heavy pressures on the so-called “third party” ethnic communities. Those communities, like the Tartars in Bashkortostan or Kryashens in Tatarstan, have been concurrently Russified, Bashkirified and Tartarified. For example, in Bashkortostan, where Tartars are nearly one third of the populace, as many 33 print media periodicals are released, with 23 of those coming out in Russian, 9 in Bashkir and just one in Tartar. Notably, the authorities of the Republic of Bashkortostan have refused to grant registration to the ethno-cultural autonomy of Tartars. They justify this refusal by referring to the absence of a legal basis on the republican level, but Federal Law “On Ethno-Cultural Autonomies” requires no supporting republican-level statutes and expressly allows ethno-cultural autonomies across the Russian Federation to be established without constraints. The authorities of Tatarstan maintain that the local Kryashens have no right to exist as a separate ethnic community, insisting that those people are descendants from baptized Tartars. This circumstance notwithstanding, on October 13, 2001, Tatarstan’s Kryashens held a republican conference of Kryashen ethno-cultural associations. The Conference delegates ruled to convene an international Kryashen congress, scheduled for February–March 2002, and passed a declaration on self-determination of Kryashens. The declaration reads that the Kryashen people are a distinctive Turk ethnic community with its own native language, alphabet, cultural heritage and history. The Kryashens are for the most part Russian Orthodox devotees settling in compact communities in the lands of Bashkortostan, Tatarstan, Udmurtia and the Orenburg region. Out of 320 thousand Russian-based Kryashens, as many as nearly 200 thousand are living in Tatarstan, according to the Kryashen movement leaders. Hardships experienced by the local Kryashens have been reported by 80 delegates that arrived to the Conference from different administrative units of Tatatrstan. To provide an example to this end, over the past decade, nine Kryashen village communities have disappeared from the map of the Elabuzhsky district (Tatarstan) and out of 30 local administration heads only two are ethnic Kryashens. Notably, the Tatarstani history textbooks written in the Tartar language carry slanderous passages on the role of the Kryashens over the past centuries. In particular, the Kryashens are portrayed as Tartars baptized by Ivan the Terrible of Russia. However, during the XVI century, the Kryashens had already been moving from paganism to Christianity, according to current Kryashen researchers. Given the biased official approach to this issue, Kryashen children are reported to have been experiencing a sort of an ethnic inferiority complex, with heightened depression and other problems relating to the persisting self-identity crisis. In addition, this uneasy situation has been compounded by the massive unemployment across nearly all Kryashen rural communities, which leads to higher suicide rates among in particular the younger Kryashens. Regrettably, this troubling situation is yet to be addressed by the local administrations and republican authorities (9). Not a single rural Kryashen community has an ethnic Kryashen as administration head in the Nizhnekamsky district of Tatarstan. One of the Conference participants revealed that the Bolshiye Aty-based Kryashen community had all of their farming equipment, horses and cows (hogs — to a lesser extent) confiscated by the authorities and transferred to the neighboring Tartar community. This resulted in an increase in Kryashen unemployment and an outflow of the younger people to larger towns and cities. None of the 20 Kryashen communities in the rural Zainsky district can boast of a single religious shrine. The believers are compelled to hold their religious gatherings on private premises. Conversely, most of the neighboring Tartar communities have newly-built Islamic mosques. The Islamic mosque versus Christian shrine statistical comparison is especially striking. While one mosque accounts for 1 500 Tartar-Muslims, one church is intended to provide religious services to about 50 thousand Orthodox Kryashens. Notably, the Nizhnekamsk city administration just ignored an application by more than 400 local Kryashens for construction of an Orthodox church in the city. The situation in the Nalim-based Kryashen community likewise is problematic. The funds raised by the local Kryashens to rebuild the Intercession Church in the village had been appropriated by the local administration to restore a mosque in the township of Tatarsky Nalim. To provide yet another example, though the Akhmetyevo rural community is equally peopled by Tartars and Kryashens, the former received a mosque, while the latter, nothing. What is more, the local Tartar cemetery has been tidied up at the public’s expense, but the Kryashen burial ground has been left neglected. The overall impression is that a focused policy has been pursued to get rid of the Kryashens. Given that more often than not the Kryashen rural communities have been left without either access roads or new communications links, an effort appears to be under way to augment unemployment among the Kryashens and trigger massive outflows to larger towns and cities. The diminishing villages can then be labeled as “phasing-out” settlements, one example being the village of Maksimovka (Mendeleevsky district, Tatarstan) populated by about 30 retirees (10). A somewhat more tolerable situation seems to have developed in the town of Naberezhniye Chelny, where the town administration head has made an attempt to satisfy the Kryashens’ requests. The Kryashens have been assigned two rooms for their activities, including a Sunday school in the House of People’s Friendship financed from the town budget. Unfortunately, elsewhere in Tatarstan the authorities have shown little interest in the Kryashens’ needs. Also, it has been reported that some regional publications were clearly libelous of the Kryashens. One example can be seen in the provocative remarks of T. Minullin, member of the State Council of Tatarstan. Following the October 13, 2001 Kryashen Conference, T. Minullin said that the Kryashens would be seen as traitors and would phase out of existence within the next three decades should they choose to secede from the Tartar community. Predicament of Small Indigenous Ethnic Communities in the Russian North, Siberia and Far East Russia’s northern reaches, roughly two thirds of the country’s territory, are populated by 11 million residents. Importantly, the nation’s north provides 70% of forest revenues for the government coffers. The indigenous ethnic communities are reported to total about 200 thousand people. Thirty small-sized Russian-based ethnic communities maintain their independence within the confines of autonomous districts. Traditional economic activities pursued by the northern indigenous ethnic communities during Soviet times had been appropriately backed by the central government. Over the past few years, the reindeer population has been radically shrinking, with the fish and fur mining tasks becoming unprofitable. Since 1990, the fertility rates among the local ethnic communities have dropped by one third, with the death rates nearly rising by two times. The averaged life expectancy of the northern indigenous people stands to be 10–12 years lower than for the entire Russian population. Also, for example, while a Russian Eskimo’s life expectancy is on average about 45 years, an Alaskan Eskimo expects to live until he/she is 72 years of age. The local maternal death rates exceed the national Russian indicator by two–three times. Over the past six years, 20 indigenous Russian northern ethnic communities have been growing smaller, with some of those now totaling only a few hundreds of individuals. (11) Admittedly, the small indigenous ethnic communities located in the Russian Far East and Siberia, though the economic challenges and weather conditions they have to face obviously appear to be less dramatic, have encountered similar hardships. While the Trans-Volga and the North Caucasus ethnic communities continue to take advantage of their positions of autonomy to assure their development, many of the small indigenous ethnic communities in the Russian north, Far East and Siberia (that are dwarfed by local non-indigenous communities) merely have to act as poor supplicants seeking favors from administrations of the local autonomous districts named after the relevant indigenous peoples. One of just a few options for local ethnic communities to have access to power in the relevant regions would be for those indigenous peoples to be given certain quotas in local and regional governing bodies of subject of the Russian Federation. Pursuant to Federal Law “On Safeguards for the Rights of Small Indigenous Peoples of the Russian Federation,” these ethnic communities, indeed, have ample opportunities to take part in the work of law-making bodies of regional governments and local authorities. Article 13 of the aforementioned law reads that for those opportunities to be implemented, regional laws can be passed to establish quotas for the indigenous ethnic communities to be adequately represented in the legislatures of relevant subjects of the Russian Federation. For example, the Khanty-Mansiisky district legislative body has five seats designated for representatives of the indigenous northern peoples. However, most of the remaining Russian regions do not have this kind of legislation. In addition, while such quotas may actually be assigned, this arrangement is normally done unofficially through the use of the so-called administrative resource. To underscore, while being viewed as ethnic minorities, the small groups of indigenous peoples of the Russian Federation enjoy a whole range of rights pursuant to the law. Article 69 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation enables them to live in keeping with universally accepted standards. Article 72 of the RF Constitution stipulates that the central and regional authorities are jointly committed to assure protection of the small indigenous ethnic communities living their traditional lifestyles in their natural habitats. These baseline provisions are backed and developed by a number of other federal and regional laws. However, the applicable legal mechanisms for implementation of the aforementioned rights of ethnic communities are far from being perfect. What is more, the standing federal programs to back up the small indigenous ethnic communities in the Russian Federation have annually been under-funded. The Evenk, Koryak, Nenetsky and Chukotsky autonomous districts; Amur, Irkutsk, Kamchatka, Magadan, Sverdlovsk, Tomsk and Chita regions, as well as Primorsky territory have beein failing for the last three years to have their far-away settlements and areas appropriately provisioned for the long winter months as promised. The governmental program for economic and cultural development of small ethnic communities in the Russian northern territories, which aimed to put in place industrial and social infrastructure, has year after year failed to meet its goals. Specifically, several facets (construction of public schools, hospitals, meat and fish packing plants, highways, etc.) of this program have not been carried out at all because of lack of funding. What is more, Federal Program “Children of the North” in 2001 had not been fully funded. With the monetary target standing at 13 080 000 roubles, the actual money received was 10 187 000 roubles. No money has been released to cover such budget items as: education and training of teachers-members of the northern ethnic minorities, improving skills of social and educational workers coming from local indigenous communities, distributing medications and healthcare products to faraway locations. Notably, the decreasing output of the traditional economic sectors has significantly contributed to the growth of unemployment in indigenous ethnic communities. The unemployment rate for the active indigenous population in the Amur region reached 51%, with this indicator for the region as a whole being 12% and for all of Russia — 8%. Unemployment rates for northern-based ethnic communities tendering reindeer herds or hunting and trapping cannot be measured by statisticians because of the unique aspect of these activities. Excessively high death rates for the Russia’s northern ethnic minorities are largely the result of a range of social and biological factors. Social factors include sharp reductions in government funding for activities geared towards children, closing down of state-owned (and thus offering relatively chaep-priced good) stores and supply bases, extreme poverty, and inadequate diet, especially in the spring (many indigenous residents survive on breads baked from flour supplied as humanitarian aid from the West). Given the fact that Russian northern ethnic minorities have for many centuries been isolated from other communities within the country, they have no genetic “firewall” against numerous contagious diseases, which are much more dangerous to them than to the rest of Russia’s population. Tuberculosis has been particularly lethal to them of late. In addition, the local indigenous residents for the most part are genetically susceptible to alcohol. Death rates from alcohol consumption have been 15–20 times as high as those for the peoples of Russia from the middle or southern latitudes, according to the Siberian division of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Thousands of local residents are killed by vodka, which is very much like an epidemic. However, alcohol dealers operate without any constraints in these territories, according to A. Anisimov, member of the Council of Federation of the Evenk autonomous district. Unless urgent steps are taken, the number of northern indigenous peoples in the Russian northern territories may become three times smaller within the next 15–20 years. The RF Council of Federation launched a motion to have alcohol sales limited in the areas populated by the small indigenous northern ethnic communities. Russian senators propose that alcohol sales should be banned during the trapping seasons and when reindeer herd transits to winter and summer pastures. During other periods, alcohol sales are to be rigorously regulated. The bill has now been dispatched to 55 subjects of the Russian Federation for approval and suggestions. Thirty seven subjects have already sent in their confirmations; nine regions have requested some further clarifications; the other nine have refused to back the document. Notably, while alcohol resellers continue to intoxicate indigenous residents and rob them in the process, local authorities pay no attention to unconstrained deliveries of liquor to the dying ethnic communities. The northern indigenous reindeer breeders continue to experience severe hardships. Breeding and tending reindeer herds is the only economic and cultural pursuits, as well as the entire focus of many northern ethnic communities in Russia. Continued interferences by local and regional authorities in the life of indigenous communities have not served to any improvement in the latter’s conditions. For example, in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) only the larger reindeer breeding farms receive some financial backing pursuant to the 2001 ruling by the regional government on supporting the agro-industrial complex. The family-sized operations have not been allowed to receive any government funding. Notably, out of 99 million roubles designated for the local reindeer breeders, merely 53 millions were to be allocated as promised, with 46 million of which to be spent on management-related tasks. As a consequence, having lost their traditional commitments, the reindeer breeders largely remain idle, become alcoholics, and die. Out of 2 400 local reindeer breeders, by the year 2001 as many as 248 persons had died (their average life span being 35 years of age) and 266 remain unemployed. The latter cannot receive unemployment benefits because the relevant legal provisions do not cover them. With industrial development and assimilation of the Russian northern territories (populated by the indigenous ethnic minorities) continuing unremittingly, reindeer grazing grounds have radically deteriorated and diminished in size. Industrial operations lead to erosion and destruction of the very thin fertile soil layer. Vast areas of sands are exposed in the process, preventing local moss from regenerating. Reindeer are thus deprived of food. Apart from the diminishing natural feeding grounds, available fresh water sources have increasingly become polluted. Large numbers of animals are dying as a consequence. As the fishing quotas are allocated, the priority right of indigenous communities to enjoy access to their traditional waters has often been breached because locals simply cannot afford to purchase the requisite licenses. While they continue to suffer from the lack of funding, indigenous fishermen continue to fish in violation of environmental security and natural resource preservation laws. As a result, the stocks of muksun, Siberian white salmon, Siberian white fish and other rare fresh water species have radically dwindled. In the meantime, visiting resellers continue to acquire the high-value fish from from locals at very low costs, flying their helicopters directly to the fisheries to collect fresh catch. On April 12–13, 2001, Moscow hosted the Fourth Congress of Small Indigenous Peoples of the Russian North, Far East and Siberia (such congresses are held every four years), which attracted representatives of 41 ethnic minorities. Interestingly enough, none of the leaders of the 29 subjects of the Russian Federation containing small groups of indigenous peoples attended, except for M. Nikolaev, President of Yakutia. At the completion of their deliberations, the delegates of the Congress appealed to the government of the Russian Federation on the following points: to establish a permanent prosecutor oversight ensuring observation of the legal rights of indigenous ethnic minorities; to create an insert stating the holder’s ethnic identity in domestic passports; to draft and assure passage of Federal Law “On the Territories Traditionally Managed by Small Indigenous Peoples of the Russian North, Siberia and Far East”; to maintain local hospitals, maternity facilities and relevant supply bases; to keep public schools servicing these communities functional through high school. Also, the Congress continued to demand that rigid control be introduced to regulate the inflows of alcohol products to the areas densely populated by smaller indigenous ethnic communities. A measured response to the aforementioned Congress’ appeal was made by Federal Program for Economic and Social Development of Small Indigenous Peoples of the Russian North through the Year 2011, adopted by the Government of the Russian Federation in July 2001. Within the next nine years, the Program is expected receive funding of 2.74 billion roubles. Plans have already been drawn up to expend the authorized resources to more effectively address the pressing problems of the Russian indigenous northerners. It is deemed necessary to substantially back reindeer breeding operations, support traditional fishing, trapping and handicraft activities, set up a chain of integrated processing facilities, preserve the environment and increase the wealth of the areas occupied by indigenous ethnic communities. The cost of these efforts is estimated to be 794.79 million roubles. The reindeer breeding objective requires “administering veterinary services, fighting predators, regulating the populations of wild reindeer herds, improving reindeer fertility rates, improving survivability of the animals and taking advantage of open grazing grounds in order to raise the population of domesticated northern reindeer to the level of 2 million heads.” The Program’s funding, however, is reported to be disproportionately distributed among the various challenges. For example, the job of restoring a chain of state-owned stores and supply bases to support traditional indigenous economic pursuits would cost around 389.86 million roubles. The Ministry for Federation Affairs insists that indigenous ethnic communities, particularly with nomadic lifestyles, would not be able to do without available supply bases. To point out, as much as 665.54 million roubles is expected to be appropriated to raise the living standards of local ethnic minorities in the Russian northern territories and provide for the requisite level of healthcare services (12). L. Nimaeva, head of the Department for the Development of Small Indigenous Ethnic Communities, within the Ministry for Federation Affairs, stated publicly that “the designated funding level is too small and must be increased.” She commented: Though the experts from the Ministry for Federation Affairs insisted on other figures, the Ministry of Finance officials argued that level of financing ought to be realistic. Had we failed to go along with the Ministry of Finance’s constraints, the Program would have never been adopted, with all commitments towards the 28 northern subjects of the Russian Federation running the risk of being wrapped up within a very short time. However, the resources needed for the Program to be executed are yet to be raised. Merely 979.8 million roubles are expected to come from governmental coffers. Governments of the pertinent subjects of the Russian Federation have been committed to raise a total of 1.36 billion roubles for the purpose, with the remaining 400 million roubles expected to be generated through extra-budgetary arrangements. For those goals to be achieved, numerous legislative amendments would have to be introduced to the relevant federal laws. For example, taxes for the mining of natural resources would have to be revisited, and an effort should be launched to begin development of the local natural wealth resources on the basis of production sharing agreements, according to L. Nimaeva. Importantly, part of the inherent cost should be borne by the companies cleared to operate in the areas peopled by the smaller indigenous ethnic communities. Astapovich, head of division from the Bureau of Economic Analysis argued: Clearly, executing the Program would just be a waste of money and efforts because it is too limited. There has been much talk over the last few years about abandoning the Program altogether. Any government-funded program may suffice to handle just one problem if the the financing is adequate. It appears to be pointless to set about to tackle the problems of the Russian northern territories without adequate financing. Alas, the federal authorities are not likely to start tackling the pressing problems. At the close of last year, the newly appointed Minister for Ethnic Policies, V. Zorin, defined his approach to funding the indigenous peoples in the Russian northern territories. When asked about who was going to define the ethnic policy if the government fails to adequately support the activities, he pointed out, “Once your company’s interests reach the Russian northern territories occupied by smaller ethnic communities, you should be directly motivated to make sure their living standards are decent (13).” Indeed, a very special problem has been created by the private-sector extraction and mining businesses in their relations with the northern indigenous peoples. The ongoing effort to assure passage of local laws to protect the interests of indigenous ethnic communities has been persistently countered by the mining companies operating in those territories. Wherever such laws had been passed, they have rarely been enforced. To provide an example to this end, the Khanty-Mansiisky autonomous district legislative body passed a law on mining the natural resources under which the relations between the operating oil companies and local indigenous ethnic communities are supposed to be governed pursuant to the relevant provisions whenever industrial activities are maintained within the territories held by the said communities. However, the relevant damages and redress-related claims have been evaluated and completed with tremendous difficulties, and no punitive measures have been applied to the extraction companies that have breached the law. Over the past few years, for one, the Khanty-Mansiisky autonomous district has passed a numbers of laws on the protection of interests of indigenous ethnic communities, including Law “On Takeover and Assignment of Land Properties in the territory of the Khanty-Mansiisky Autonomous District.” Though this statute had been drafted to normalize relationships between the operating oil companies and indigenous ethnic communities, its basic goal had been poorly interfaced with the need to assure the inalienable rights of indigenous peoples that continue to live and work abiding by common law. Pursuant to the said local law, an oil company is merely required to secure the given land property holder’s consent to launch a development project. Should that consent be unavailable, the pertinent authorization could be secured from the regional government. Should that government decision fail to be supported by the family of the local trapper or fisherman, the latter could file a suit in a court of law. To underscore, the traditional lifestyles of indigenous ethnic communities generally rule out any takeover or removal of land properties from the original holders. Importantly, the Hunty, Mansy and Nents communities living in the Russian northern taiga territories have traditionally been committed to preserve their tribal swathes of land unaltered and unmodified. A good model for relations between the indigenous ethnic communities and industries could be made by the experience accumulated by the huge “Alrosa” company, according to M. Nikolaev, former President of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). Seven years ago, each of the smaller ulus-type administrative units, where “Alrosa” had its industrial operations in progress, received a 1% stake in the company (with 8% of the company’s equity capital being distributed to eight local ulus administrative units). In addition, 2% of the company’s sales revenues have been consistently transferred to the specified local communities. To point out, one quarter of all Yakutia land is currently taken up by the so-called “reserve areas” set aside for future generations, according to M. Nikolaev. Given that M. Nikolaev’s successor as President of Sakha (Yakutia) is V. Shtyrov, head of the “Alrosa” diamond-mining company, it remains to be seen who is going to be first to tap those “reserve areas.” However, the authorities could easily repossess the territories assigned for the smaller indigenous ethnic communities. V. Loginov, Governor of the Koryak autonomous district, revoked his predecessor’s ruling to establish the “Tkhsanom” nature preserve for the indigenous ethnic communities, thereby effectively robbing the local Itelmenys of the opportunity to fish. (Fish makes up the bulk of their diet.) A few years ago, the status of legal-entity was conferred on a union of indigenous communities who had negotiated for this status with the autonomous district administration. This status enabled the Itelmenys to trap and fish in order to provide for themselves. Notably, this union had been empowered with a veto right over questions of natural resource protection and utilization. The union was also authorized to protect their natural resources, with members of the local indigenous communities being assigned to support the regional-level environmental security services. Then, “all of a sudden,” it was publicly announced that a license had been granted to an outside company seeking to develop a coal deposit within the “Tkhsanom” preserve area, and a promising oil and natural gas deposit had been put on the auction block. To compound it all, the fish stock protection inspectors stated that during the salmon-spawning season they were not able to distinguish between indigenous fishermen and poachers because their passports carry no mention of their ethnic identities. In the Khabarovsk territory, the local Orochy ethnic community turned to the Regional Court of Arbitration with a request that the OOO “TiS” logging enterprise pay for damage caused by logging operations in the Khutu river valley of the Vaninsky district (a traditional Orochy locality). The community’s representatives insisted that license for the operation had been issued without Orochy’s consent. But most importantly, the entire logging deal received a negative ruling from the regional government’s environmental security inspectors at the very beginning. Regardless of the above, the timber production effort launched in 1999 is expected to be carried on through 2004 pursuant to the relevant business agreement. The Orochy complaint reads as follows: Since the “TiS” company and eight other private businesses started their logging operations in the Khutu-river valley, more than half of the available 700 thousand hectares of hunting and trapping grounds have been destroyed. With the forests shrinking, the wildlife populations (upon which the indigenous communities continue to be heavily dependent) have been radically reduced. In the past, the Orochy would trap 30–40 heads of sable per hunting season — now, trapping 10 sables would be a feat. Without their customary earnings, the local trappers and hunters are doomed to extreme poverty… The regional court of arbitration did not support the Orochy claim (14). The Murmansk region legislators passed a package of laws to have the Kola Peninsula’s indigenous ethnic communities both “assisted in the implementation of their rights to live and develop their native languages and cultures, traditions and customs” and “supported in their efforts to preserve their long-standing habitats and lifestyles.” Then, pursuant Presidential Decree “On Urgent Steps to Protect the Areas Traditionally Peopled by the Smaller Indigenous Ethnic Communities in the Russian North,” the Murmansk regional lawmakers passed Provisional Regulations for Recreational Fishing Pursuits and Law “On Land Property Tax Rates for Operators of Reindeer Grazing Grounds.” However, all those laws and regulations have not resulted in any improvements in for the local Saamy people. What is worse, the indigenous people have not only had their special privileges violated but also their civil rights infringed upon. To illustrate the above, Provisional Regulations for Recreational Fishing in Murmansk Region stipulate that the priority fishing rights go to the local indigenous communities and families and businesses maintained by members of those communities in the specified areas. However, those rights have been for all practical purposes overruled by Rules for Recreational and Sporting Fishing in Closed Waters within Murmansk Region, adopted by the Murmanrybvod authority (regional office of the State Committee for Fishing Operations). The indigenous people and local reindeer breeders are permitted to use specified bodies of water and streams for fishing only in order to provide for themselves, using fixed-size nets. Interestingly enough, a high-value fish catch per day shall not be in excess of 5 kilograms, with a lower-value fish catch limit is 10 kilograms. The Murmanrybvod authority not only limited the Saamy’s rights established by federal laws but also assigned the priority fishing rights to the local tourist companies that employ the Saamys as manual laborers. Long-term business agreements between tourist companies and local authorities concluded in 1994 unilaterally and unlawfully invalidated all of the earlier three-way arrangements (when enterprises belonging to the indigenous community were equal partners). Since then the Association of Kola Saamys has repeatedly approached different regional authorities to correct current imbalances. All appeals and applications have been either ignored or turned down. The Murmansk pen-pushers have authorized an American company, Harris Loomis, to exclusive use of the resources of the Ponoy, Varzino, Lumbovka, Kachkovka and Drozdovka rivers and all of their tributaries through the year 2010. The company is reported to be thriving on the natural resources that used to be held by the indigenous inhabitants. The Saamys now rarely catch any fresh water fish (15). Numerous native languages of the ethnic communities in the Russian northern territories are reported to be dying out. “Language researchers state that the current state of affaires regarding less widely used ethnic tongues is extremely alarming,” says Professor D. Nasilov, a leading expert in the area of ethnic minority languages from the Institute of Asian and African Countries, Moscow State University (16). The alarming trend appears to be driven by the following: while the ethnic communities themselves fail to sustain their language, the governing bodies of all levels have largely ignored those smaller. To illustrate the point, the “Russia’s Languages” website carries the following information: while 42% of the Saamys see the Saamy language as their native tongue, 56% of the Saamys regard Russian as their native language; 23% of Nivkhys see the Nivkhy language as their mother tongue, while 76% regard Russian as their native language. The Taimyr-based Nganasanys are the most patriotically-minded indigenous community, with 84% of the community’s members continuing to speak their native language. The generally-accepted policy runs as follows: if you take an interest in a minority language, go ahead and raise the funding needed to achieve your objective. The thriving or dying of smaller ethnic languages now seems to be wholly dependent on how those languages happen to be perceived by the local bureaucracies. For example, the Nanay language had been solidly backed before the Khabarovsk territory got a new administration. The language was then made an optional rather than a compulsory subject, and speedily lost the status of an active vehicle of person-to-person communication. In Yakutia, the Russian, Yakut and English languages are studied on a compulsory basis. Naturally, it appears to be quite a problem for a public school curriculum to also carry such compulsory disciplines as the Evenky or Yukagiry languages (17). The 1995–2004 period was proclaimed by the UN General Assembly as the International Decade for the World Indigenous Peoples. Notwithstanding the ongoing global effort, the smaller indigenous ethnic communities from the Russian north, Siberia and Far East are unlikely to survive through the coming decades if the current state of affairs remains unchanged. (1) Kommersant (December 19, 2001, ¹231). (2) See: “On the Chechen Situation” by the “Memorial Society” at www.memo.ru. (3) Nezavisimaya Gazeta (May 25, 2001, ¹92). (4) As reported by Bulletin of the Ethnology Monitoring Network and Conflict Early Warning (October 16–31, 2001, ¹23). (5) Zvezda Povolzhya (June 15, 2001). (6) Vremya i Dengi (September 20, 2001). (7) Eastern Express (September 28, 2001). (8) Dobriye Sosedy (December 26, 2001). (9) A. Rufimsky, “Kyashens: From Lawlessness to Self-Determination.” NG-Religions (November 14, 2001, ¹21). (10) Ibid. (11) Izvestia (April 13, 2001). (12) E. Kats, “Money for the Northerners.” Vremya Novostey (August 2, 2001). (13) Kommersant (December 19, 2001). (14) Tikhookeanskaya Zvezda (January 19, 2002). (15) O. Ganshina, “Of Fruits and Roots.” Nezavisimaya Gazeta (May 29, 2001, ¹94). (16) Vremya MN (September 26, 2001). (17) Ibid. Finishing of the report Back |
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