In Free Elections, 70 Percent of Daghestanis would Vote for Independence, Akhmetov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 5 – Were they given a chance to vote freely, 70 percent of Daghestanis would vote to become an independent state, Akhmad Akhmetov, a former championship coach in Daghestan who now lives in Ukraine and is doing everything he can to defeat Russia which is oppressing his people just as it is oppressing Ukrainians and so many others.

            Akhmetov concedes that 30 percent of Daghestanis would vote to remain within Russia but only because they have either been zombified by Moscow propaganda or bought off by the Russian authorities (radiosvoboda.org/a/ukrayina-konhres-narodiv-dahestanu/32106890.html in Ukrainian; kavkazr.com/a/budem-delatj-vse-chtoby-rossiya-proigrala-prezident-kongressa-narodov-dagestana-o-voyne-v-ukraine/32114033.html in Russian).

            But most Daghestanis have lost any confidence in Russia which rules them like a colonial power, seeks to destroy their languages, culture and religion, and in the current war has mobilized almost three times as many Daghestanis per capita than Moscow said it would do. (On that , see kavkazr.com/a/v-dagestane-i-kalmykii-v-dva-raza-perevypolnili-plan-po-mobilizatsii-/32066742.html.)

            According to Akhmetov who has been in Ukraine for five years and hopes to acquire Ukrainian citizenship if a new law simplifying the process is put into place, Moscow has taken so many men from Daghestan and other republics so that it can avoid the problems taking more from major cities like Moscow and St. Petersburg would create.

            “The Kremlin has always arranged things so that not the central cities but the regions are the ones fighting its wars. Those regions, where the standard of living is low, where there is unemployment, where people cannot find work to feed their families. Daghestan and similar regions have been drawn into this war as contractors of the Russian army,” he continues.

            The Russian authorities “are not carrying out mass mobilizations in Moscow or in St. Petersburg because they know that revolutions begin precisely in those cities.” But they are increasingly promoting revolutionary feelings on the periphery as protests against the war in Ukraine and mobilization for it take place there show.

            The Daghestani leader says that he will do anything he can to help Ukraine resist Russia because in doing so he is helping Daghestan as well. He adds he does not fear death but only being confined “for life” in a Russian prison as those non-Russians who fight for Ukraine put themselves at risk if they are captured.

            According to Akhmetov, he will resist Russia just as his ancestors did and as his grandchildren will if that is needed and believes that ever more Daghestanis now in Ukraine will join the Shamil Battalion to fight the current Russian aggression. (On that unit, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/11/shamil-battalion-from-daghestan-now.html.)