Ingush Justice Ministry Suspends Council of Teips for Three Months

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 29 – Having detained the president and vice president of the Council of Teips of the Ingush People for their role in protests in the republic, the Ingush government of Yunus-Bek Yevkurov has now suspended the operation of that organization for three months. Under the suspension, the group is banned from organizing or taking part in meetings.

            If the Council violates those restrictions during the period of its suspension, officials say, the Ingush government will move to “liquidate” the organization permanently (fortanga.org/2019/05/minyust-ri-prinyal-resheniya-ostanovit-deyatelnost-soveta-tejpov-iz-za-prizyva-ne-peredavat-zemli-osetii/  and zamanho.com/?p=8390).

            The suspension, issued by the republic justice ministry last week, is the latest effort by Yevkurov to go after his opponents. Ostensibly, the ban has been imposed for two reasons: for a YouTube appeal in early May calling on deputies not to vote for a border accord with North Ossetia, something officials claim despite evidence was “fake news” and for irregularities in the group’s registration uncovered in an earlier raid that the Council has supposedly left uncorrected.

            This is not the first time Yevkurov has tried to ban the Council.  Two years ago, he tried to liquidate the organization, but the republic Supreme Court ruled against the government, saying that all of its complaints were either baseless or concerned violations in registration procedures that the Council had corrected.

            The Council of Teips is the largest and most authoritative public organization in Ingushetia, uniting more than 90 extended families or teips, which are the foundation of Ingush society.  It was active in organizing protests against Yevkurov’s border agreement with Chechnya last fall and has been involved in protests against him this spring as well.

            Yevkurov’s decision to go after the teips is almost certain to prove counter-productive, leading to more anti-Yevkurov attitudes and actions by a broader swath of the population and making it almost impossible that any agreement could be reached between society and the regime as long as Yevkurov is in it.