CHECHNYA PROCLAIMS ITSELF INDEPENDENT (1991)

With the break-up of the USSR, some republics proclaimed their independence and Chechnya did so under the leadership of the former Soviet general Dzhokhar Dudayev.

In 1993 Dudayev dissolved parliament, imposed severe censorship and introduced a direct presidential government that was both authoritarian and personal, although with significant popular support. This government, which according to some analysts turned Chechnya into a bandit state, fostered policies that favoured the interests of Dudayev and his coterie.

THE FIRST WAR: DEFEAT OF THE RUSSIAN ARMY (1994-1996)

Russia recognised the de facto independence of Chechnya until the end of 1994, when Russian troops carried out an attack with the purpose of taking Grozny, a battle that they believed would be won within a question of hours.

What lay behind the intervention of Boris Yeltsin’s government?

· To put on a show of force and offer the Russian people an example of national cohesion.

· To control the oil industry and the oil pipeline routes through the territory.

· To ensure that Chechen independence did not set a precedent that threatened the unity of the Russian Federation and its south border.

· Possible agreements between the Russian and Chechen mafias close to power.

The Russian occupants carried out barbaric acts, such as the massacres of the villages of Samashki and Bamut. The Russian troops had gradually been gaining ground with difficulty until 1996 when an attack by the Chechen troops (commanded by Colonel Aslan Maskhadov) defeated the Russian army and control of the capital, Grozny, and of the region's main cities was regained.

On 31^st August 1996, Maskhadov and the Russian general Alexander Lebed signed the Khasaviurt Agreement, putting an end to 20 months of conflict with a final toll of 90,000 civilian deaths and 400,000 displaced persons and refugees. The peace agreement provided for the pull-out of Russian troops from Chechen territory and set a deadline of 21/12/2001 for defining the final political status of Chechnya.

PERIOD OF “NORMALIZATION” OF CHECHEN LIFE (1997-1999)

In 1997 presidential elections were held and Aslan Maskhadov was elected president. Maskhadov’s government, freely chosen by the majority of the Chechen people, encountered many difficulties in stabilising the country: economic activity had been completely destroyed by the war; inter-clan rivalries undermined its authority; and mafia activities based upon oil smuggling and kidnapping, rife throughout the republic, constituted a further challenge.

However, the brokered peace deal enabled the return of thousands of refuges to their homes and the return to some kind of civil normality.

1999-2001: THE SECOND WAR

With the presidential elections of early 2000 on the horizon and with his popularity at an all-time low, Yeltsin was seeking an heir apparent who could guarantee him impunity from the cases of corruption tainting him and his family. His designated successor was the former head of the FSB (the KGB’s post-Soviet successor), the unknown Vladimir Putin, who needed to gain popularity in order to achieve a successful outcome in the elections.

Yeltsin appointed Putin prime minister and soon after, in the summer of 1999, two murky events occurred which the Kremlin used to justify a new war in Chechnya.

· the incursion of the Chechen guerrilla Basayev in Dagestan with the intention of annexing this republic to Chechnya.

· the wave of terrorist attacks on residential buildings in Russia attributed by the Russian government to Chechen terrorists but attributed by many analysts to the FSB (formerly the KGB).

These events changed not only public opinion but also that of most Russian political parties in respect of a new military attack on the now independent Chechnya and regarding a violation and breach of the Khasaviurt agreements.

As such, on 1^st October 1999, Putin ordered the Russian army to invade Chechnya with three times as many troops as those involved in the first war: 140,000 soldiers to occupy a country with less than half a million civilians. Moreover, 42% of troops were mercenaries.

This conflict was far more destructive than its predecessor; it was an indiscriminate attack on everything and everyone by the Russian army. Grozny, the capital, was occupied in February 2000 following intense bombardments that caused devastation on a scale only comparable to that of Dresden and Hiroshima in the Second World War. The target was the civilian population: it is estimated that 120,000 civilians were murdered or victims of the general massacres carried out in neighbourhoods and villages (sadly known as zachiskas or cleansing operations).

Large-scale torture, disappearances and kidnappings were carried out with impunity and met with the international silence that has characterised this war. In order to avoid the criticism aimed at Yeltsin during the first invasion of Chechnya, Putin imposed a news blockade and impeded access to Chechnya. Foreign journalists and human rights organisations were particularly unwelcome.

Once the capital and the cities on the plains were occupied by the Russian army, the legitimate Chechen government led by Maskhadov was forced to head for the mountains in the south of the republic, where it continued to operate from hiding.

One year after Grozny was taken, in January 2001, Moscow considered the war concluded. Putin announced the progressive withdrawal of troops, which has never actually taken place: despite the official line, the armed conflict continues.

In 2009, some 22,000 troops of the Russian Federation remain deployed in the region that must begin to withdraw from the republic from April, according to the official order ending operations.