Paul
Goble
Staunton, June 1 – Not one of the
2,000 Muslims currently living in Ukraine’s Luhansk Oblast favors secession or
transferring their region to the Russian Federation, according to the leader of
that community. Instead, even though many of them come as he does from parts of
Russia, they are proud to be citizens of Ukraine.
Seyfulla Rashidov, a professor at
the university there who came from Daghestan 35 years ago and now heads the
Salam Muslim community, told the local newspaper that he does not know anyone
among the believers there who is backing or is even sympathetic to the secessionists
(realgazeta.com.ua/?p=1896).
A major reason for that is that most
of the Muslims in Luhansk are from parts of the Russian Federation, regularly
travel there, and know what is happening in the places of their birth. Those
who back the secessionists, on the other hand, have either never been to Russia
or were there only a long time ago.
Many of the latter – and they do not
include any Muslims – see their support for the secessionists as a way of
complaining about low pay because they think they will get higher wages if they
are not part of Ukraine. That explains
the overwhelming support instructors in his university and in the police have
given to those who want to break away from Ukraine.
But Muslims know better. They are
living better in Ukraine than they did in the areas from which they came.
Otherwise they would not be there, Rashidov said. And what they have seen in their places of
birth in recent times has been anything but inspiring and attractive. They are loyal Ukrainians, and they are
better off in Ukraine.
At the same time, he continued, all
Ukrainians need to work together to end corruption, to ensure the rule of law,
and to boost wages, and they need to be open to the possibility of better
relations between their country and Russia in the future. Rashidov suggested that the post-World War II
cooperation of France and Germany could be a model.
Rashidov’s declaration is especially important not
only because it suggests that much of the impulse behind the Moscow-backed
secessionist movement is economic rather than ethnic but also because it shows
that opposition to what Russia is doing in Ukraine is intense among all Muslims
there and not just the Crimean Tatars.
And that in turn means that Moscow’s
introduction of fighters from Chechnya will likely fail for yet another reason:
the Muslim groups from whom the Kadyrovtsy as they are known might have
expected a welcome or even support are likely to be the most consistent in
combatting the appearance of such fighters.
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