Resistance Movement for Sakha Independence Issues Programmatic Declaration

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 20 – Earlier this month, in the wake of the Tokyo Forum of Peoples of Post-Russia, national activists in Sakha (Yakutia) met in secret to create a committee to press for the independence of their republic (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/08/sakha-activists-meet-in-secret-to-plan.html).

            Initial reports were necessarily sketchy (t.me/freeyakutiafoundation/3276 and abn.org.ua/en/liberation-movements/hey-will-seek-the-independence-of-the-region-a-secret-congress-was-held-in-yakutia-to-secede-from-russia/), but now the group has issued a programmatic document.

As posted online by ABN Correspondence (abn.org.ua/en/documents/saha-independence-movement-resistance/), the declaration reads as follows:

For four centuries now, our Sakha Republic has been a colony of Moscow, our people have been enslaved by Russia against their will, our resources have been plundered, our nature has been trampled on.
Now, during the military aggression of the Kremlin criminals against the free people of Ukraine, our men are being used in a deadly conflict, depriving our families, our people of a bright future.
It’s time to put an end to this, secede from the Russian Federation and become an independent democratic state.
To achieve this, I, Raisa Zubareva, together with my like-minded people, organized the Resistance Movement for the Independence of Sakha.
Our task:
– to wage an uncompromising struggle against the Kremlin regime, regardless of who will lead it, until victory.
Our goal:
– achieve the independence of the Sakha Republic, return power to its citizens on their own land.
Our principles
1. Any citizen of the Republic of Sakha, regardless of nationality, can become a participant in the movement.
Anyone who shares the goals and principles of the Movement and acts in their defense can consider himself a part of the Movement.
2. Strategy is centralized, tactics are decentralized
We are creating an operational headquarters that will determine the strategic priorities of the Movement.
Representatives of various already well-known republican opposition initiatives can enter the operational headquarters.
Movement members can perform tasks autonomously.
3. Each participant in the movement independently determines the acceptable course of action
To achieve the goals of the Movement, any action is welcomed that is not aimed at intentionally causing harm to the life and health of civilians of the Republic of Sakha. The right to self-defence is guaranteed by law.

            Were Sakha to gain independence, it would be a country larger than all of the EU states put together and would be enormously rich in natural resources ranging from diamonds and coal to rare earth minerals. However, its small population – just under one million -- and its lack of a port on the Pacific – make the attainment of that goal difficult.

            But before dismissing this possibility out of hand, two things should be kept in mind. On the one hand, foreign countries like China have a serious interest in gaining exclusive access to the natural resources of Sakha and might provide support (https://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/06/chinese-analysts-say-sakha-wants.html).

            And on the other, it should be remembered that the Soviets took many years to establish effective control over this distant and far-flung land and that the numerically small peoples have enormous resources to resist and then promote their goals, as was classically outlined in Russian émigré writer Edward Topol’s 1986 novel, Red Snow.