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The ongoing conflict between the Russian government and Chechen separatists is brutal, growing, and unlikely to end any time soon, said professors Paul Christensen of the political science department and Cynthia Simmons of the Slavic and Eastern languages department last night. The presentation titled "Chechnya: A Lecture on the Renewed Catastrophe," focused on causes of the conflict and the issues that continue to fuel it.
Central to the discussion was last September's attack on a school in Beslan, Russia, near the Chechen border, which involved more than 1,000 hostages and left several hundred dead, many of them children. Despite a 1997 peace treaty between the breakaway republic and the Russian government, the attack was one in a flurry of recent violence, perpetrated by both sides.
"Beslan," said Christensen, "is up to now the most deadly event in the spiraling cycle of violence in the region." It also signifies a widening of the conflict beyond the immediate borders of Chechnya, he said.
Christensen sees the horror of the Beslan attack as the direct result of the actions of the Russian government. "The level of brutality [on the part of Russia] ... has, I think, been the underlying driving force for the radicalization of the conflict," he said.
The war in Chechnya began in 1994 as Russia, under former President Boris Yeltsin, sought to reign in what was a relatively independent Chechen government for fear of Chechen independence acting to destabilize other areas of the country. The first phase of conflict ended in 1997.
It began again under current President Vladimir Putin, who, Christensen said, sought to solidify his own power by exploiting the conflict there.
"My own sense of it," he said, "is that it has as much with Putin's desire to solidify his leadership position as it did with events in the region."
Also important is the presence of oil in the region, he said. A major Russian oil pipeline runs through Grozny and establishing control of the region is important to the Russian economy.
The role of Putin's government, according to Christensen and Simmons, is central to the conflict and its prospects for a solution. In many ways, said Simmons, the events of Sept. 11 changed the attitudes of many towards the conflict in Chechnya by leading many - including Putin - to portray it as part of the international war on terrorism.
Christensen disputed the idea that Islamic fundamentalism has been a driving force in the conflict. "None of the people who were involved in the hostage taking in Beslan were from anywhere outside Chechnya or Ingushetia," he said. "There were no Arab, Islamic fundamentalists there, as far as the evidence suggests."
Neither he nor Simmons rejects the role of fundamentalist Islam in the conflict outright, but Christensen suggested that it is a product, not a catalyst, of the conflict.
"It's now true that fundamentalist Islam has become a bigger and bigger factor, but that was not true that this conflict started," he said. "To the extent that fundamentalist Islam is now a problem, it's a problem that was created in the course of the conflict."
The portrayal of Chechen rebels as international terrorists, according to Simmons and Christensen, gives Putin a wide freedom to pursue policies that otherwise might be broadly condemned.
"Russia is presently considered an unfree state, and is likened to the Brezhnev era," said Simmons, referencing the rule of former Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev. Journalists, and others who may be considered dissidents, are regularly harassed by the Russian state, she said.
Putin's tendency towards authoritarianism has only worsened as a result of the conflict in Beslan. Christensen says friends in Russia report a "palpable increase in state control" since the Beslan massacre.
This movement towards stricter rule also manifests itself in more brutal conduct on the part of Russian forces towards Chechen rebels, something Christensen says leads "to further radicalization of the Chechens."
Noticing the bleak picture painted of the conflict by Christensen and Simmons, several students asked about prospects of peace.
Simmons raised the possibility that the other nations might take an interest in the Chechen conflict, saying, "My ... hope would be that the international community would have the muscle to take on another situation [like the conflict in Kosovo]."
Christensen, however, responded to the idea of international attention in the region with pessimism. "The only reason people might start paying attention to Chechnya and the other violations of rights that are going on in the region ... is because of oil," he said.
"Given what each side thinks about the other, I don't see what will break the cycle of violence," he added. "What happened in Beslan is going to happen again."
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