Paul
Goble
Staunton, March 18 – No one is
especially happy with the borders of Russia’s North Caucasus Federal District
and at least one region, Stavropol, is currently seeking to leave it. No one in
Moscow currently appears to have a plan for change, but an Israeli expert on
the region is proposing what might be done to improve the situation.
Because Vladimir Putin has called
for the amalgamation of Russia’s federal subjects and because the federal
district in which the North Caucasus republics have been changed twice over the
last decade, the atmosphere for such proposals, even from abroad, is more
favorable than it was when the author of this note suggested border changes for
the South Caucasus in 1992.
At the very least, the analysis
behind this new proposal helps to clarify the nature of the problems in the
region and the choices Moscow faces if it hopes to improve the administration
of a region that remains anything but settled and one that it hopes to pacify
before the Sochi Olympiad a year from now.
In an article posted on APN.ru on
Friday, Avraam Shmulyevich suggests that senior officials in Moscow are well
aware that “the existing administrative-territorial borders, especially in the
North Caucasus, were drawn in Soviet times if not earlier, have exhausted
themselves,” and need to be changed (www.apn.ru/publications/article28679.htm).
Shmulyevich
recounts the history of federal districts in the Russian Federation. Seven were
created by President Vladimir Putin in May 2000 and then modified by his
successor, Dmitry Medvedev, who carved the North Caucasus Federal district out
of the Southern Federal District in January 2010.
That
district includes Daghestan, Ingushetia, Kabardino-Balkaria,
Karachayevo-Cherkessia, North Osetia-Alania, Chechnya and Stavropol kray and
has as its center the city of Pyatigorsk. But its creation three years ago has
satisfied no one, and it is clear, Shmulyevich argues, that “an optimal variant
has still not been found.”
Indeed,
he suggests, it quickly became clear that the new district was “creating more
problems than it was solving” and both officials and expert observers began to
suggest that there must be “further reforms of the administrative-territorial
borders” of the federal districts in general and “in the first instance,” those
in the North Caucasus.
That
priority reflects the fact that the North Caucasus Federal District was created
to “stabilize” the region and reduce the amount of violence there, but the situation
has in fact developed in exactly the opposite direction, Shmulyevich argues.
Consequently, it is time for a change, something that almost everyone now
acknowledges.
There
are several reasons for this, he says. First, the new district was supposed to
put the North Caucasus under the control of one man. But in fact, that region
remains divided between to federal districts, and its diversity means that any
attempt to impose a common answer to its various problems will backfire.
Second,
the borders of the North Caucasus Federal District are not congruent with those
of the North Caucasus Economic Region which includes all the federal subjects
of the NCFD plus the Kalmyk republic, Astrakhan oblast and Volgograd oblast. Third, the geographic and political borders of
the North Caucasus do not correspond either.
Fourth,
the NCFD consists of two very different parts, “’Russian’ Stavropol” and “’the
national’ republics.” That has allowed greater migration from the non-Russian
areas into Stavropol and exacerbated inter-ethnic tensions there, sparking both
violence and ethnic Russian outmigration.
Fifth,
the NCFD divides the Terek and Kuban Cossack communities, Shmulyevich
observers, creating problems for them and for Moscow. Sixth, the current
arrangements further divide the already much-divided Circassian community, most
of whose members are in the NCFD but some of whom, in Adygeya and Krasnodar are
left outside.
Seven,
these divisions in turn have contributed to the growth of Islamist movements
across the region. Eighth, the exclusion of Rostov oblast, Krasnodar kray and
Adygeya from the NCFD has “created additional administrative problems” for that
region. And ninth, the NCFD highlights the reality that the Russian authorities
“do not see the [vast] differences between the Eastern and Western Caucasus,”
something that Shmulyevich describes as “a strategic error.”
The
Israeli expert suggests that these differences in religious affiliation, ethnic
homogeneity, Russian presence and economic activity should be the basis for the
formation of two federal districts in the North Caucasus in place of the
existing NCFD.
The
first of these, the West Caucasus Federal District (or possibly Azov-Black Sea
FD) would include Rostov oblast, Krasnodar kray, Stavropol kray, Adygeya,
Kabardino-Balkaria, Karachayevo-Cherkessia, and Osetia and could be centered Vladikavkaz
Krasnodar, Maykop, Rostov or even Stavropol.
Such
a district would have “a high percentage of ethnic Russians, no deep Islamic
traditions, religious diversity, and relative ethnic homogeneity” among the
indigenous groups. And is economic potential would be based on industry,
agriculture, and mountain resorts.
The
second, the Eastern Caucasus Federal District or possible Pri-Caspian FD, would
include Ingushetia, Chechnya and Daghesan. It could have its center in Grozny,
Makhachkala or possibly a new city or a rotating capital. There would be “no Russians” in it, the
populations would be strongly Islamic, and they would be ethnically diverse.
Economically,
Shmulyevich says, they would rely on oil production and the generation of
electrical energy, communications, and some agriculture, especially in
Daghestan.
He
suggests that this division would have “the following advantages” as compared
to the current arrangements. It would
reduce or eliminate tensions arising from peoples living in divided areas.
Thus, the Circassians would find themselves in a single FD something that “would
reduce the sharpness of the problem of their administrative division”
otherwise.
Such
an arrangement would unite “all the regions of the Caucasus where an ethnic
Russian population remains,” reduce non-Russian immigration into Stavropol, “simply
the position of Osetia,” and include the most Islamic republics, Ingushetia,
Chechnya and Daghestan in a single FD which would make a single policy for them
easier to design and implement.
And
all these things, Shmulyevich concludes, would allow Moscow to pursue “a more
flexible policy in the region,” one that would be based on the differences
between the eastern and western portions of the North Caucasus, thereby “increasing
stability and the authority of the Federal Center in the Caucasus.”
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