Chechnya Demands Ingush Agree to Have Shariat Court Resolve Border Dispute

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 19 – Chechnya has followed up Ramzan Kadyrov’s threat to use force to recover what he considers Chechen lands in Ingushetia if Ingush continue to complain about his activities along the border with a demand by the speaker of the Chechen parliament Magomed Daudov that Magas agree to turn the entire matter over to a shariat court.

            In making that demand, Daudov disparaged the Council of Teips of Ingushetia and its efforts to resolve the border controversy on the basis of careful research. He suggested that the Ingush group was simply “a manufacturer” of fakes and that only Muslim judges could correct that situation (fortanga.org/2021/11/daudov-vyzval-ingushej-na-shariatskij-sud-po-voprosu-o-graniczah/).

            Not surprisingly, the leaders of the teips are outraged; and ever more Ingush are angry that Chechnya is acting in this way with complete impunity and that their own republic head, Makhmud-Ali Kalimatov has said nothing, apparently fearful of provoking Kadyrov (kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/370208/ and fortanga.org/2021/11/eksperty-obyasnili-molchanie-kalimatova-po-povodu-rabot-na-reke-fortange/).

            Ingush activists say that this back and forth with Grozny threatens to trigger new public protests in Ingusheti (fortanga.org/2021/11/sovet-tejpov-ingushetii-nazval-provokacziej-ugrozy-kadyrova-otnyat-zemli-u-respubliki/), something even more likely as the trial of the Ingush Seven winds down. In their summations, defense attorneys called the proceedings a medieval “inquisition” rather than a modern trial (fortanga.org/2021/11/vystuplenie-advokata-v-sude-po-delu-ingushskih-aktivistov-vozmutilo-prokurora/).

            Prosecutors demanded that the court declare the lawyer out of order, but the judge refused. The authorities, however, appear to have taken their revenge: After a seven-hour hearing, they kept the Ingush Seven locked in a cold bus for a further five hours as a sign of who is really in charge (fortanga.org/2021/11/podsudimyh-po-ingushskomu-delu-proderzhali-u-sizo-v-essentukah-pyat-chasov-v-avtozake/).