The Northern Caucasus is awash today with fire and blood. What is the cause of this? The rise of a radical Islam, developed from Wahhabism (the traditional Islam preached by Saudi Arabia)? Certainly not.
It is the uinterrupted war that Russia has waged in the area since 1994 which has led to the perpetuation of a conflict which is a century and a half old and which with every day threatens to engulf the whole region.
In 1991, with the breakup of the USSR, all the former Soviet republics of the southern Caucasus and one from the northern Caucasus proclaimed their Independence. The international community as well as Russia legally recognized all these new States and they were admitted to the UN, with one exception, Chechnya.
in 1994, Russia launched its first war to reconquer Chechnya, which was enjoying a de facto independence. In spite of a relationship of military forces that was very favorable to Moscow, the Chechnyans won the conflict, leading to a political agreement with the Russian autorities in 1996. This agreement recognized Chechnya' independence in fact, if not in law.
However, in October 1999, Moscow decided on a new military intervention. The Russian forces completed the destruction of Grozny, the capital of Chechnya, subjecting it to bombarments of an intensity reminiscent of the most terrifying episodes of the Second World War (Dresden for example).
Since this time the Russian army in Chechnya has behaved like a true army of occupation, increasing its exactions against the civilian population. Most of the Chechnyan civilian population had fled to the neighbouring republic of Ingushetia, but they were forced to return to Grozny in order to give the impression of a normalized situation.
Far from having led to a stabilization of the situation, these military operations led to permanent confrontations between the Chechnyan resistance and the Russian army. More than ever a political solution is required, involving direct negotiations between the Kremlin and the Chechnyan president who was elected democratically in 1997, Aslan Maskharadov.
By rejecting any negotiated solution, Moscow, supported by the West, encourages the growth of radical Islamist