Press Review

Black January: the bloody birth of the Azerbaijani nation

By: David Stern, Baku, Jan 20, 1999

Salakhadin Ragimov, 41, came to Martyr's Lane Wednesday as he has every year to pay his respects to victims of "Black January," Azerbaijan's anniversary of a bloody Soviet crackdown in 1990.

Clutching some red carnations in one hand and his young son in the other, he filed past the black granite gravestones of the victims buried here, the most hallowed spot on Azerbaijani soil.

"I come here to see those who died for our freedom," Ragimov says as he deposited the flowers at one of the headstones before heading for the exit with some of the thousands of others who came to honour the dead.

"And I bring him here to show him who our enemies are -- the Soviet army," he says, nodding to his 10-year-old son. "This is a day of mourning for the entire Azerbaijani people."

Nine years after Soviet forces rolled into the capital under orders to put down anti-Armenian riots ignited by the conflict in Nagorno Karabakh, the anniversary has not lost any of its emotion for the nation.

Close to 200 were reportedly killed and hundreds more injured as troops opened fire on civilians and crushed others under their tank treads. Some officials claim the number of victims was actually much higher.

Some Azerbaijanis contend that the anti-Armenian pogroms were in fact Moscow-organized, in order to give the Soviet army a pretext to enter the capital and suppress the local Popular Front independence movement.

However, the crackdown actually helped the independence movement gain in strength and contributed to the breakup of the Soviet Union. Hundreds of thousands of Armenians also fled the country after the January 1990 events.

Although the true facts surrounding January 20 may never be known, the day has acquired a meaning beyond merely remembering the dead, representing now the country's common sacrifice in its struggle for independence.

Black January is now the solemnest date on the country's national calendar. All businesses and restaurants are closed, street vendors are barred for the day and music cannot be played in public.

All foreign television channels are blocked, leaving only the two government stations, which show continual scenes from the Martyrs Lane cemetery along with commentary on the seriousness of the occasion.

"The January 20 events played a decisive role in awakening the national consciousness," one television commentator intoned, while the thousand-fold crowd marched past in the background.

"It was the final attack from imperial Russia to try to preserve its position," he continued. "It was the fight between communism and anti-communism, democracy and totalitarianism."

Other observers see Black January as the event, which helped unify the country and create a national identity, where previously none had existed.

"If you walk through Martyr's Lane, you see gravestones from all ethnic groups and religions -- Azeris, Jews, Christians, Russians, etc.," said Thomas Goltz, an expert on the region and author of "Azerbaijan Diary."

"Like so many states created in the 20th century, Azebaijan was born from the emotional trauma of blood and violence," he continued. "January 20 unified the country in its grief and helped create a nation."

Indeed, Black January can be seen as a day of national reconciliation, where the country's bitter political divisions are forgotten for the moment and all unite in a common past and against a common enemy.

Leading figures from the government and opposition took their turn in paying their respects to the dead and laying wreaths at an eternal flame overlooking the panorama of Baku's bay.

"This is a great day, and the positive in it is much greater than the negative," said Tofik Gasymov, foreign minister under the former Popular Front government and an arch opponent to President Heydar Aliyev.

"This is an event for the entire country, when there are no differences between the opposition and the government," he continued. "Today we are all the sons of one nation."

Agence France Presse, January 20, 1999

BLACK JANUARY IN AZERBAIJAN

Fifth year of mourning and commemoration

Late at night on January 19, 1990, Soviet troops stormed Baku. They acted pursuant to a state of emergency declared by the USSR Supreme Soviet Presidium, signed by President Gorbachev and disclosed to the Azerbaijani public only after many citizens lay wounded or dead in the streets, hospitals and morgues of Baku.

More than 130 people died from wounds received that night and during subsequent violent confrontations and incidents that lasted into February; the majority of these were civilians killed by Soviet soldiers. More than 700 civilians were wounded. Hundreds of people were detained, only a handful of whom were put on trial for alleged criminal offenses. Civil liberties were severely curtailed.

The behavior of Soviet armed forces in Baku must be judged in the context of their actual mission. Mikhail Gorbachev’s use of force in Baku was nothing but the desperate attempt to stop dissolution of Communist ruling in Azerbaijan. The Soviet army was trying to rescue the totalitarian regime, the rule of Communist Party and Soviet empire.

Then-USSR Defense Minister Dimitri Yazov stated that the use of force in Baku was intended to prevent the de facto takeover of the Azerbaijani government by the nonCommunist opposition, to prevent their victory in upcoming free elections (scheduled for March 1990), to destroy them as a political force, and to ensure that the Communist government remained in power.

Human Rights Watch report, entitled ”Black January in Azerbaijan", states: "Indeed, the violence used by the Soviet Army on the night of January 19-20 was so out of proportion to the resistance offered by Azerbaijanis as to constitute an exercise in collective punishment. Since Soviet officials have stated publicly that the purpose of the intervention of Soviet troops was to prevent the ouster of the Communist-dominated government of the Republic of Azerbaijan by the nationalist-minded, nonCommunist opposition, the punishment inflicted on Baku by Soviet soldiers may have been intended as a warning to nationalists, not only in Azerbaijan, but in the other Republics of the Soviet Union."

"The subsequent events in the Balfic Republics – where, in a remarkable parallel to the events in Baku, alleged civil disorder was cited as justification for violent intervention by Soviet troops – further confirms that the Soviet Government has demonstrated that it will deal harshly with nationalist movements," continues the Human Rights Watch report.

The Wall Street Journal editorial of January 4, 1995 stated: "It was Mr. Gorbachev, recall, who in January 1990 chose to defend his use of violence against the independence-seeking Azerbaijan on the grounds that the people of this then-Soviet republic were heavily armed gangs of hooligans and drug-traffickers who were destabilizing the country and quite possibly receiving support from foreign governments."

Gross violation of human rights and mass manslaughter in Azerbaijan caused little reaction of Western powers. Mikhail Gorbachev’s regime was adamantly supported against "heavily armed gangs of hooligans and drug-traffickers."

The brutal use of force in Azerbaijan created an anti-force. It buried chances of preserving the collapsing empire and resurrected national movement for independence.

In 1991 Azerbaijan became independent.

AZERBAIJAN NEWSLETTER
Embassy of the Republic of Azerbaijan –
Washington, D.C. – January 20, 1995

January 20, 1990 is a special day in Azerbaijan's history

January 20 is a very important day for Americans because that is the day every four years when the President is inaugurated. But it is also one of the most important, if not the most important, date in the history of Azerbaijan.

It was on Saturday, January 20, 1990, that 26,000 Soviet troops under orders from Mikhail Gorbachev invaded Baku, killed one hundred forty innocent civilians, and set in motion the events which led to Azerbaijan’s independence a year and a half later. The significance of the events in Baku on January 20, 1990 cannot be overestimated. Peaceful demonstrations had been taking place for several weeks in downtown Baku, protesting Soviet control of Azerbaijan and the arbitrary decisions (dictated by Moscow) of local communist officials.

In fact, Azerbaijan was the first of the former Soviet republics to mount a serious move toward independence, and it was the prospect of a breakup of the Soviet empire that prompted Gorbachev to send both armored troops and KGB officials into Baku. He succeeded temporarily in preventing independence, but he was unable to stop the quest for freedom, and, in fact, accelerated the process by enhancing nationalistic feelings among all Azerbaijani people.

It is interesting now, seven years later, to look back at those events and the world’s reaction at the time. Gorbachev, of course, was something of a hero in the West because of his policies of glasnost and perestroika. But, in fact, Gobachev had no intention of breaking up the Soviet Union he merely wanted to "reform" communism to extend its life.

The Washington Post reported on January 21, 1990 that the situation in Azerbaijan had "presented Gorbachev with his ’gravest crisis' since taking power in March 1985." On January 23, The Washington Times reported that some Soviet experts warned "that Azerbaijan could become Moscow's next Afghanistan, but some U.S. experts believe that it might become the Kremlin’s Northern Ireland."

Throughout the 70 years of Soviet reign, Moscow used ethnic differences and tensions to maintain internal control. Stain was master of the divide and conquer game. He transplanted thousands of people of various ethnic backgrounds to either dilute their strength or to counter other ethnic groups. In Azerbaijan’s case, he expelled several hundred thousands Azerbaijanis from Armenia and gave a strip of land to Armenia that separated Azerbaijan from its region of Nakhichevan, both to internally divide Azerbaijanis and to prevent a direct link between Azerbaijan proper and Turkey.

In 1988, the ethnic conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan began when ethnic Armenians in the Azerbaijani region of Nagorno Karabakh unilaterally declared their independence. While neither the Soviet Union nor any other nation gave recognition to this unilateral declaration of independence, reactionary forces used the conflict to keep Armenians and Azerbaijanis divided and, therefore, under tight Soviet control.

Soviet army and Spetznaz troops fired indiscriminately at civilians, some of whom were merely watching events from their windows or the sidewalks. Ambulances carrying the wounded were fired upon. The Washington Post reported January 22 that Russian photographer told Western reporters in Moscow, who were banned from travelling to Baku, that "Soviet soldiers fired at almost anything that moved in the early hours of their occupation." Again in classic Soviet fashion, Soviet military authorities announced on January 23 that no one had been killed in Baku since the Saturday invasion, while at the same time more than one million Azerbaijanis gathered to mourn the dead who were buried in a park overlooking Baku, now known as the Martyr’s Cemetery.

The West, fearful of undermining Gorbachev, was very circumspect in its reaction. The press reported January 26 that President Bush said Gorbachev had done a "remarkable job" in handling the situation in Azerbaijan and that British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher told the House of Commons she had "great sympathy" for Gorbachev as "he tries to keep his nation from unravelling." The Washington Post reported on January 21 that the White House "expressed regret at the ’already heavy loss of life’ in Azerbaijan, and called ’upon all involved to act with restraint in the use of force and to show respect for the rule of law and the rights of individuals concerned."

A more candid assessment of the West’s reaction came in a January 21 Washington Post dispatch: "As ethnic strife and secessionist pressures buffet the Soviet Union, U.S. officials have been forced to acknowledge that the United States has a stake in President Mikhail Gorbachev’s survival that now outweighs the old Cold War hope that the U. S. S. R. might fragment or fall apart." What the West failed to comprehend was that the events in Baku that January seven years ago were for Azerbaijan no different from what happened in Budapest, Hungary in 1956 and Prague, Czechoslovakia in 1968.

While some in the West may have been fooled by Gorbachev’s justifications, the Azerbaijani people were not fooled. They instinctively knew - as did the people of Hungary and Czechoslovakia -- that what was happening was the destruction of their freedom. That’s why thousands of Azerbaijanis surrounded Communist Party headquarters demanding the resignation of the republic’s leadership. That’s why thousands of Azerbaijanis in Turkey rallied near Turkey’s border with Azerbaijan. That’s why the Baku City Council demanded that Soviet troops be withdrawn. That’s why even the Soviet legislature in Azerbaijan condemned the occupation as "unconstitutional" and threatened to call a referendum on secession unless Soviet troops were withdrawn within 48 hours. That's why there were reports of mutiny by Soviet Azerbaijani military cadets, and why Azerbaijani oil tankers blocked Soviet naval vessels from reaching the Baku harbor.

Despite a news blackout, hundreds of Azerbaijanis in Moscow used short-wave radios to listen to Voice of America and BBC to learn what was happening in Baku. Many of these Azerbaijanis gathered in Moscow seeking information and demanding explanations. At that point, on the day after the invasion, Azerbaijan’s current President Heydar Aliyev – who was living in retirement in Moscow – made his first public appearance since his resignation from the Soviet Politburo and Government in 1987. He broke the information blockade in Moscow concerning the Soviet attack, and strongly urged international condemnation of the invasion.

Soviet troops were eventually withdrawn from Baku, but political control was maintained for almost another two years until Azerbaijan’s parliament declared independence in October, 1991. Azerbaijan has maintained its independence for five years, despite lingering economic and social problems from the Soviet era, and despite the military occupation of 20 percent of Azerbaijan by Armenia. The Republic of Azerbaijan has a freely elected president and parliament, the beginnings of free market reforms led by the energy sector, and, most importantly, no foreign troops on its soil.

Yes, January 20 is an important date in American political history. It symbolizes American democracy and freedom. By the same token, January 20 is perhaps the most important date in the history of the new Republic of Azerbaijan. For it was on that date that the citizens of Azerbaijan stood up to Soviet bullets and tanks; martyrs gave their lives to begin the struggle for freedom from communism and dictatorship. Indeed, January 20, 1990, in Baku, Azerbaijan, the fate of the Soviet empire was sealed, because it quickly became apparent that even the might of the Soviet military could not extinguish the hopes and dreams of a people seeking freedom and independence.

AZERBAIJAN NEWSLETTER
Embassy of the Republic of Azerbaijan –
Washington, D.C. – January 20, 1997

Tragedy of January 20 Remembered

Hafiz M. Pashayev
Ambassador

In the first hours of January 20, 1990, Soviet troops stormed Baku, Azerbaijan’s capital, in what became known as the Black January, one of the most tragic events in the country’s recent history. Indiscriminate massacre of civilians and the use of heavy military equipment was the Soviet authorities’ response to popular demands for more sovereignty and end of Communist regime. There were no armed people among more than 130 civilians killed and 700 wounded by the troops. January 20, 1990, became a national tragedy, victims of which represented Azerbaijan’s diverse and multi-cultural society. Among them were a 7-year old boy, a newly married couple, an 80-year old man, a 16-year old girl, a young doctor shot in an ambulance while helping another victim, and many others.

That day, nine years ago, the Alley of Martyrs was established in Baku’s hilltop park, where the victims of the Black January were laid to rest. Since then The Alley has expanded to receive victims of the war with Armenia.

While the events of January 20 in Baku were unprecedented by their scale and brutality, they were preceded by earlier attacks on civilians in Almaty, Kazakhstan, and Tbilisi, Georgia, in 1986 and 1989 respectively, and were followed by use of force in Vilnius, Lithuania, and the unsuccessful Coup d’Etat in Moscow in 1991.

According to “Black January in Azerbaijan”, a report by Human Rights Watch, “Among the most heinous violations of human rights during the Baku incursion were the numerous attacks on medical personnel, ambulances and even hospitals.” The report concluded that: “Indeed the violence used by the Soviet Army on the night of January 19-20… constitutes an exercise in collective punishment…The punishment inflicted on Baku by Soviet soldiers may have been intended as a warning to nationalists, not only in Azerbaijan, but in other Republics of the Soviet Union. ”

Despite the curfew and repression which followed January 20, that day became a turning point for Azerbaijan and strengthened determination of the people to build their own independent country. In 1991, Azerbaijan became independent and in April of 1993 the first among the former Soviet republics with no Russian military bases on it soil.

Among many Azerbaijanis united in their effort to tell the truth about January 20 in Baku known, was Azerbaijan’s current leader Heydar Aliyev, who lived in retirement in Moscow. His strong condemnation of Soviet leadership for this invasion at an improvised press – conference in Moscow on January 21, 1990, was his first public appearance since resignation from the Soviet Politburo in 1987. Soon after the Black January 1990 Heydar Aliyev resigned from the Communist Party.

Every year on January 20 citizens of now independent Azerbaijan pay their tribute to those who gave their lives for the country's independence.

AZERBAIJAN NEWSLETTER
Embassy of the Republic of Azerbaijan –
Washington, D.C. – January 20, 1999

Azerbaijan commemorates 1990 tragedy

Islamabad - The People of the Azerbaijan Republic on January 20, Wednesday, commemorated victims of "Black January" - the most tragic event in the modern history of Azerbaijan, when the Soviet army occupied. Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, at midnight of January, 20, 1990. Hundreds of innocent unarmed people were shot that day on streets of Baku, and other cities of Azerbaijan and more than 700 were wounded, says a press release issued by the Azerbaijan embassy here.

The cruel use of force by the Soviet army units in Azerbaijan on the order of Mikhail Gorbachyev was another manifestation of the policy of intimidation pursued earlier in Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Georgia and Lithuania. Under the protest of restoring constitutional order unprecedented bloody attack was aimed at crushing opposition movement in Azerbaijan's bid for independence and preventing the dissolution of the communist regime.

In the autumn of 1989, the national independent movement had reached an incredible moment when hundreds of thousands of people demonstrating for the ideals of independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Azerbaijan. Black January became a turning point in the history of Azerbaijan.

Commemoration ceremonies were all over the country and flags were flying half-mass in cities and rural areas. A ceremony of mourning for the victims of 1990 was held in Shahidlar Hiyabani (Martyrs Cemetery) in Baku.

"The Pakistan Observer" January 22, 1999

Embassy of Azerbaijan observes "Black January"

By our Staff Reporter

Islamabad - The diplomats and peoples of Azerbaijan in Islamabad observed "Black January" on Thursday to mark the Armenian invasion of their country in 1990, which left over a million Azerbaijanians as refugees in their own country, thousands dead and many more injured.

The Embassy of Azerbaijan in Islamabad issued a Press release on this occasion to recall the memory of the victims of "Black January" of the year 1990. According to the Press release issued by the Embassy here, today on the first of February of 1990 there were 706 people who came to the health institutions of Azerbaijan to ask for help. The institution of forensic medicine registered 84 cases, including 73 cases with bullet wounds (including 16 at the back), 8 cases of those who were run over by the armored troop-carriers and two cases with bayonet wounds.

"As per the fifth of January, 1990, 170 people were killed including six Russians and seven Jews, Tatars and Lezgins. Among those killed were six woman and nine children and teenagers. As many as 370 people were wounded, and 321 people were missing. During those tragic events, the doctors, who tired to reach the wounded, were killed, the ambulances were fired at and a children's hospital and many dwelling houses were also targeted." the Press release said.

The Press release said that the instability, serving for independence an sovereignty in the Caucasian Republics of former Soviet Union, will their mosaic ethnic composition started to increase army before the collapse of the USSR.

"As that time the political situation in one of the republics of the Caucasus, i.e. Azerbaijan was very grave an repealed and increasing signals start coming to the Soviet leadership the Union measures were determining".

"The central government of the Soviet Union, supporting a separate movement of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh, reorder military assistance to them and to the Republic of Armenia, which laid territories claims to Azerbaijan to suppress its national liberation movement and striving of people for independence".

"The Soviet leadership trying a restore control over them used military forces in January 20, 1990 in Baku, Azerbaijan. This tragic event was not only counter-productive, but also bad a highly destabilizing effects which resulted in mass anti-Soviet and anti-Communist activities in Azerbaijan. "The people of Azerbaijan realised that the cleansing of Azerbaijanians from Nagorno-Karabakh was an aggression of the Republic of Armenia against the Azerbaijan Republic. Its main go was to stop the national liberation movement of Azerbaijani people."

"The Nation", January 22, 1999

THE TRAGEDY OF JANUARY 20, 1990
TENTH YEAR OF COMMEMORATION

In the first hours of January 20, 1990, Soviet Troops stormed Baku, Azerbaijan's capital, in what became known as the Black January, one of the most tragic events in the country's recent history. Indiscriminate massacre of civilians and the use of heavy military equipment was the Soviet authorities' response to popular demands for more sovereignty and end of Communist regime. There were no armed people among more than 130 civilians killed and 700 wounded by the troops. January 20, 1990, became a national tragedy, victims of which represented Azerbaijan's diverse and multi-cultural society. Among them were a 7-year old boy, a newly married couple, an 80-year old man, a 16-year old girl, a young doctor shot in an ambulance while helping another victim, and many others.

That day, nine years ago, the Alley of Martyrs was established in Baku's hilltop park, where the victims of the Black January were laid to rest. Since then The Alley has expanded to receive victims of the war with Armenia. While the events of January 20 in Baku were unprecedented by their scale and brutality, they were preceded by earlier attacks on civilians in Almaty, Kazakhstan, and Tbilisi, Georgia, in 1986 and 1989 respectively, and were followed by use of force in Vilnius, Lithuania, and the unsuccessful Coup d'Etat in Moscow in 1991.

According to ""Black January in Azerbaijan," a report by Human Rights Watch, "Among the most heinous violations of human rights during the Baku incursion were the numerous attacks on medical personnel, ambulances and even hospitals.'' The report concluded that: "Indeed the violence used by the Soviet Army on the night of January 19-20...constitutes an exercise in collective punishment... The punishment inflicted on Baku by Soviet soldiers may have been intended as a warning to nationalists, not only in Azerbaijan, but in other Republics of the Soviet Union."

Despite the curfew and repression which followed January 20, that day became a turning point for Azerbaijan and strengthened determination of the people to build their own independent country. In 1991, Azerbaijan became independent and in April of 1993 the first among the former Soviet Republics with no Russian military bases on it soil.

Among many Azerbaijanis united in their effort to tell the truth about January 20 in Baku known, was Azerbaijan's current leader Heydar Aliyev, who lived in retirement in Moscow.

His strong condemnation of Soviet leadership for this invasion at an improvised press-conference in Moscow on January 21, 1990, was his first public appearance since resignation from the Soviet Politburo in 1987. Soon after the Black January 1990 Heydar Aliyev resigned from the Communist Party.

Every year on January 20 citizens of now independent Azerbaijan pay their tribute to those who gave their lives for the country's independence.

Press-release
Embassy of the Republic of Azerbaijan to China
18.01.2000

Azeris remember Baku killings

Azerbaijan has been commemorating the tenth anniversary of the violence which broke out in the capital, Baku, when Soviet troops were sent in to suppress independence demonstrations and quell ethnic unrest during the final years of the Soviet Union.

More than one hundred and thirty people were killed and about seven hundred injured. The victims included a number of women and teenagers.

Correspondents say the intervention gave a huge impetus to the independence movement in Azerbaijan and caused a deep mistrust of Russia which is still felt today. President Aliyev led a special memorial service at the cemetery where the victims are buried and commemorative events are being held in Baku throughout the day.

BBC – January, 20 2000

Analysis from Washington: Another Forced Deportation?

As Russian forces continue their attacks on Grozny, Moscow appears to have decided as part of its broader campaign to render a portion of Chechnya uninhabitable and to forcibly move people living there to other locations.

At the end of last month, several Western journalists reported from Moscow that the Russian government had decided to destroy the villages of highland Chechnya in order to deny Chechen fighters any sanctuary and thus to speed the end of the conflict.

But because such actions recall some of the worst features of the Stalinist era, many Western analysts treated these reports with extreme scepticism. Now, however, a document, apparently leaked in Moscow and circulating in the West this week, suggests that Moscow has decided on even more radical measures.

The document in question consists of a report on the December 15 meeting of the Russian Security Council under the chairmanship of then-prime minister and now acting President Vladimir Putin. Marked for official use only, the two-page paper is addressed to Duma speaker Gennady Seleznev.

According to this report, which several Western analysts consider authentic, the Russian Security Council on that date addressed two issues: strengthening Moscow's influence over the member states of the Commonwealth of Independent States and suppressing the Chechens.

If the decisions concerning the CIS are very much a continuation of Moscow's recent policies, the Security Council's conclusions about how to deal with Chechnya represent a major departure from what Russian officials have said in public in the past.

According to this report, Russian forces have virtually completed the second state of what the document calls "the anti-terrorist operation for the liquidation of bandit formations on the territory of Chechnya." And the meeting thus had to decide what to do in the third phase.

The language of the report is stark: It says that participants in the mid-December meeting agreed that Chechen settlements in the mountains do not have "any economic or other value" and thus "must be completely liquidated."

All structures there -- "including cult and historical ones" -- must be viewed as potential hiding places for bandit formations, the document specifies, and thus they are to be subject to "total destruction." Such actions, the report says, will effectively "liquidate forever the basis for the rise of new bandits and terrorists."

The Security Council report provides additional details on what that will mean: "the creation of conditions absolutely unsuitable for human habitation in the future" and "the resettlement of peaceful residents from this part of Chechnya either north of the Terek River or their assimilation into other regions of Russia."

And the Security Council adds that "after the completion of military operations all construction and other materials are to be removed from this part of Chechnya," thereby making it impossible that anyone will ever be able to live there again.

Such draconian measures not only represent a significant escalation of Moscow's expressed aims of ending Chechen resistance but inevitably invite comparisons with tsarist policies in the Caucasus in the nineteenth century and Stalin's forcible deportation of the Chechens in 1944.

As tsarist forces marched into the northern Caucasus in the last century, they routinely destroyed crops and deforested much of the region as part of their effort to pacify the population. In most cases, the policy backfired and left the local population more anti-Russian than before.

Then, in 1944, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin accused the Chechens of collaborating with the Germans and deported more than 600,000 of them to Central Asia.

That bitter experience cost more than a third of them their lives and left those who remained alive and their descendents even more determined to return home and ultimately to escape Russian rule.

But neither the tsarist authorities nor Stalin's secret police resolved to make an entire portion of Chechnya uninhabitable and to forcibly move the population living there to other regions.

That is what Moscow under acting President Vladimir Putin now appears prepared to do. But unless this action leads to the total extermination of all Chechens, it is likely to have an even more disturbing outcome than did the earlier efforts of tsars and commissars.

It is likely to generate an even more radical Chechen national movement, one defined by its hostility to everything Russian and prepared to engage in precisely the kind of actions that the Russian authorities have claimed they are acting to forestall.

Washington, Jan. 21 (NCA/Paul Goble)

Site Designed by Flexible Solutions