Russia is intensifying its efforts to repatriate Chechen refugees back to Chechnya as local presidential elections loom in !
the war-torn region.
A Russian delegation visited Georgia on September 1-2 to hold talks with Georgian authorities on the return of Chechen refugees living in Pankisi Gorge. According to the latest census held by the Georgian Ministry for Refugees and Accommodation in cooperation with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, up to 3,800 Chechens are in Georgia at the moment.
“The Russian Government is ready to grant compensation payments for housing and unemployment benefits in the case of repatriation,” Stanislav Iliasov, Russian Minister for Chechnya, said after a meeting with Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze on September 2.
Stanislav Iliasov said the Russian government has allocated 5 billion rubles to reconstruct the houses of Chechen refugees.
“The homeless Chechens will receive 350 Rubles [up to USD 11,600] each, while the houses, which were partially damaged, will be reconstructed by the Russian Government itself,”!
; Iliasov said.
The Russian minister also said that a delegation of the Russian Ministry for Emergency Situations will visit Georgia in late September and will meet with the Chechen refugees in Pankisi Gorge.
“I am ready to meet with Chechen refugees living in [Georgia’s] Pankisi Gorge and convince them to return,” he added.
Russian Deputy Minister for Emergency Situations Yuri Brazhnekov already visited Pankisi Gorge in June and tried in vain to convince the Chechen refugees to return. The Russian delegation intends to visit Pankisi with representatives from the Russian-backed Chechen administration, hoping the second try will be much more successful.
Despite Russian authorities’ claims that the situation in Chechnya has improved, many Chechens are cautious about the repatriation to their homeland, where terrorist acts and armed clashes between Russian troops and rebels still occur very often.
“Russia has numerously offered us to return to Chechnya, they even promised to ensure our safety, but how can we return when Russian soldiers still stay there [Chechnya]?” Jamila Agaeva, a Chechen refugee who lives in Tbilisi, told Civil Georgia.
The Georgian authorities, as well as the UN Refugee Agency, support the Chechen repatriation only on a voluntary basis.
“The Georgian authorities support the return of Chechen refugees only in the case of security guarantees. Chechen refugees should return on a voluntary basis in order to protect their dignity and safety,” Georgian Special Affairs Minister Malkhaz Kakabadze said at a news briefing on September 2.
Many Chechens are seeking resettlement in a third country. “Chechen refugees are asking the Georgian authorities and the international community to help them leave for a third country. They think their safety will be ensured there,” says Baudin Itigaev of !
the Chechen Refugees Committee in Georgia.
According to!
the U.N. Refugee Agency’s latest report, the sharpest increase in asylum applications was among people from Chechnya. Their numbers rose by 54 percent, making them the largest group overall.
Some observers suppose that the recently intensified efforts of the Russian authorities to repatriate Chechens are due to the upcoming presidential elections in the rebel region, scheduled for October.
“With this move Russia wants to increase the legitimacy of the elections. Russia wants us to take part in the elections. Then they will push us out again,” says one of the Chechen refugees, who lives in Tbilisi.
Russian authorities dismiss these statements as groundless. “Some say that the Russian Government’s willingness to repatriate Chechens is connected with the elections. This is not true. They should return to Chechnya some day. We wish Chechens to return to their homes voluntarily,” Your Brazhnikov, Deputy Minister for Emerge!
ncy Situations said on September 1 upon his arrival in Tbilisi.
However the Kremlin’s move to announce the closure of refugee camps in Ingushetia near the Chechen border and the return 60,000 to 80,000 Chechen IDPs to Chechnya before the election increased fears of international human rights organizations that the Russian administration intends to repatriate Chechens forcefully.
Amnesty International has complained to Moscow that the refugees are being returned against their will, and that the region is plagued by “gross human rights abuses, such as disappearances, torture and extrajudicial executions.”
Many Chechens have already left Georgia and moved back to Chechnya, as their numbers almost halved after 1999, when up to 7,000 Chechens fled from the second war in Chechnya.
Georgian authorities are interested in the Chechens’ repatriation, as refugees in Pankisi are perceived as one of the threats to the shaky stability in the troub!
led gorge. Hundreds of Chechen militants found shelter in Pan!
kisi from 1999-2002; they infiltrated the region with the Chechen refugees. Georgian troops are still deployed in the gorge to maintain order in Pankisi.
But forceful repatriation of Chechens from Pankisi is hardly expectable, as this kind of move from Tbilisi would be harshly condemned by the international community.
By Goga Chanadiri
