A Blast from the Past in Grozny

BY ANNA NEMTSOVA-DECEMBER 12, 2014

Ona recent afternoon, during a visit to Grozny, the capital city of

Russias Chechen Republic, I walked with several local reporters down Putin Avenue, a street
that was named after the Russian leader in the early years of this century, not long after the
Kremlins armed forces succeeded in tamping down a long-simmering rebellion and installing a
Moscow-friendly government.
The Chechen journalists and I were walking to a monument dedicated to Journalists Who Died
For Freedom Of Speech. On it was written an inscription in Chechen: Your words remain
instead of you. Thats a line that has considerable significance in a place where more than 20
reporters have been killed since December 1994, when Russian tanks under then-President
Boris Yeltsin rolled into the republic to crush Chechen separatists. As recent events have
demonstrated, though, the traumas of the two decades of conflict that subsequently ensued have
yet to be laid to rest.
The path in the Park of Journalists was still covered with empty shell cartridges from the
fighting on Dec. 4, when a dozen jihadist fighters attacked Grozny. At one edge of the park
stood the blackened ruin of the nine-floor Press Building, a visible reminder that the war

refuses to go away. Until it was destroyed in the fighting, the building hosted newsrooms for 20
local publications.
A couple of blocks away, a group of teachers were discussing the tragic fate of Public School
20, a 65-year-old institution that has been repeatedly destroyed in the course of Chechnyas
recent wars. The school, rebuilt most recently in 2008, now lies in ruin once again: Some of the
terrorists who escaped from the Press Building ended up fighting another battle with the
security forces here the next day. Im 52 years old, said Fatima Gaziyeva, a teacher at the
school. The war took two decades of my life, and Im not sure what to say to my students
today when they ask me who attacked our cities, who killed 300,000 Chechens, and why. The
twentieth anniversary of the war is probably something you talk about in Moscow, but we live
in it. Its our reality.
When I asked my local journalist colleagues about freedom of speech in Chechnya, they just
laughed:Theres only one person in Chechnya whos allowed to say whatever he wants, and
thats the republics president, Ramzan Kadyrov. In a recent Twitter post, Kadyrov wrote that
the time when parents bore no responsibility for the actions of their sons or daughters is gone
for good. In Chechnya everyone will be held responsible! In the days that followed, unknown
men in masks burned down six houses belonging to the relatives of the suspected fighters.
When human rights activist Igor Kalyapin convened a press conference in Moscow today to
criticize Kadyrovs illegal vows of collective punishment, Kadyrov supporters bombarded him
with eggs.
The grounds for Kadyrovs fury are clear enough: The insurgents killed 14 policemen and
injured dozens of people, and the Chechen leader took it personally. If even one person from a
particular area turns out to be among the militants, all leaders of that district secular,
spiritual, and security will have to resign, Kadyrov said.
In 2009, human rights activists and journalists accused Kadyrov of personally threatening
Natalia Estemirova, an internationally recognized Chechen human rights campaigner. Natasha,
as we called her, was abducted from the courtyard of her house in Grozny and shot dead.
Kadyrov denied any involvement.
This time, Kadyrov foresaw that his threats would prompt a storm of criticism from human
rights groups, whom he has often treated as his personal enemies. So he decided to address his
critics directly, saying that he was (in the words of the Russian press agency ITAR-TASS) not
interested in the opinion of any people or the so-called human rights organizations who were
silently watching NATO planes and Western-trained militants killing millions of Muslims in
Syria and Iraq. His critics respond that Kadyrovs often unjustified and illegal actions are a
prime motivation for young Chechens to leave for Syria and join the Islamic State.
The echo of the two Chechen wars can be heard throughout the Middle East, in the North and
South Caucasus, and even in Ukraine. Akhmed Zakayev, the former prime minister of the
unrecognized Chechen republic that emerged after the First Chechen War, said in a recent
interview that Chechens in Western Europe support Ukraine in its struggle for independence.

Around 50 former Chechen insurgents have joined two Ukrainian battalions fighting against
the rebels in eastern Ukraine, while pro-Kadyrov Chechens have signed up to fight with the
Russian-backed separatists there. That means that the two-decade-old Chechen conflict has
shifted to Europe, which can hardly be seen as good news for anyone. It could be very
dangerous for Ukraine to find itself fighting a war with uncontrolled groups of Chechens
coming there to participate in their own version of jihad, Grigory Shvedov recently told me.
(Hes the editor of Caucasian Knot, a website that tracks conflict in the Caucasus.)
Kadyrov may have absolute power in Chechnya, but he still hasnt been unable to silence the
drumbeat of journalistic and human rights reports blaming him and other officials for torture,
abductions, and killings. First as deputy prime minister, then as prime minister, and now as
president (since 2007, when Putin appointed him to the post), hes been accused of human
rights violations again and again. Last week, activists fromJoint Mobile Group, a human rights
organization that tracks human rights abuses in Chechnya, told me that, over the past six
months, there has been a growing number of torture victims in the area where the Dec. 4
attackers appear to have started their journey, in three hired taxis, to Grozny.
Sergei Babinets, a lawyer with Joint Mobile Group, recalled a recent meeting between Kadyrov
and representatives of the group. Kadryov screamed at the activists, denouncing them as
enemies of Chechen people. Yet despite the risk of murder or abduction, the group continues
to operate. 50 lawyers from around Russia periodically visit Chechnya, tracking accusations of
abuses passed along by local people and making representations to the law enforcement
authorities. Chechen top officials publicly threaten Muslims here in ways that often cause
radicalization, Babinets said. The authorities would probably do a better job of fighting
terrorism by reinforcing the independence of the courts and the judiciary.
In Chechnya neither reporters nor human rights activists have had much luck in getting their
message across to Kadyrov. Yet civil society groups persist in reaching out to the authorities
and demanding justice. Kalyapin, who heads a non-government organization called the
Committee Against Torture, earned Kadyrovs ire earlier this week by filing an official
complaint to Russias federal prosecutor in which he accused the Chechen president of
violating federal law by threatening to punish the families of militants. The Russian
constitution, he noted, stipulates that citizens are presumed innocent until convicted in a court
of law a principle openly flouted by Kadyrovs demands for collective punishment.
(Kadyrov has responded to Kalyapins move by accusing the activist of providing financial
support to terrorists.)
Entirely aside from that fact, though, Kadyrovs threat to expel the relatives of militants also
has an ominous historical resonance. His language is likely to remind many of his fellow
Chechens of the 1944 roundup and transfer of virtually the entire Chechen population to distant
parts of the Soviet Union, resulting in the death of thousands. Deportation is a word that
Chechens associate with Stalin.
ELENA FITKULINA/AFP/Getty Images