Kadyrov Regime Operates on Blood Feud Principle Even While Trying to Suppress Such Actions in Others, Rights Activist Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Feb. 2 – Cases of blood feud in which the relatives of someone killed take revenge on family members of the individuals responsible have almost entirely been suppressed in Chechnya with one notable exception: if the victim is part of the Kadyrov regime, the principles of blood feud continue, Oyub Titiyev says.

            In those cases, the powers that be act precisely according to the traditions of blood feud, detaining or even killing members of the families of those they believed killed one of the families of the elite, the Chechen human rights activist says, adding that he can’t remember an exception to this pattern (kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/385511/).

            The killing of those who actually murdered someone by the relatives of the victim, however, corresponds to Islamic principles and thus continues not only in Chechnya but in Ingushetia and Daghestan as well, Akhmet Yarlykapov, a specialist on the North Caucasus at Moscow’s MGIMO says.

            He adds that the constant media attention to the problem in Chechnya shows that blood feuds continue and are unlikely to disappear anytime soon. At least in part, this apparently is because the Kadyrov regime finds them useful to maintaining the loyalty of those who work for it.