MOSCOW (Tatyana Stanovaya, for RIA Novosti) - Russia's troubled North Caucasus region is showing all the symptoms of a systemic crisis: Deepening ethnic conflicts, vicious power struggles, and increasing opposition activity.
This causes a major headache for Moscow when taking decisions on personnel reshuffles. If current regional heads are not left in their posts and given a vote of confidence, successors must be found or even outsiders brought in. In most of the region's republics, serious conflicts threatening political stability have become frequent.
North Ossetia after the Beslan tragedy was the first sign of regional destabilization. Post-Beslan, relatives of those killed staged protests calling for the resignation of regional boss Alexander Dzasokhov. The federal center's usual tactics are to avoid dangerous precedents when regional leaders are dismissed under opposition pressure. In this case, the pretext used to sack Dzasokhov was his refusal to sign a program drafted by regional presidential representative Dmitry Kozak to settle the long-running Ossetia-Ingushetia conflict, which flared up again against the backdrop of local-government reforms.
Similar reforms sparked problems in other parts of the North Caucasus. In Ingushetia, the opposition Akhki-Yurt movement and National Assembly deputy Musa Ozdoyev stepped up demands that North Ossetia return the Prigorodny District and that Ingush President Murat Zyazikov resign. The protests died down after Zyazikov appointed opposition leader Boris Arsamakov as an advisor on Tuesday of this week. Zyazikov kept his post and got a vote of confidence from the center.
Kabardino-Balkaria, previously known for its stable inter-ethnic relations, also saw things worsen when a conflict for control over the Elbrus resort area - the region's main economic resource - developed between the Balkar-dominated Elbrus region and the regional center, controlled mainly by Kabardins. A new law on local government placed the Elbrus district under central control, while local authorities saw their functions duplicated by an envoy of the regional president. The resulting protests saw thousands take to the streets.
A political crisis is also brewing in Karachai-Circassia, after the murder of a National Assembly deputy and six other residents last year sparked provoked economic conflict between Karachai clans. Opposition demands in the middle of last month that President Mustafa Batdiyev resign were staved off. But another problem appeared when the republic's fourth-largest ethnic group, the Abazins, came out against him for reasons identical to those in Kabardino-Balkaria: Opposition to a new law on local government.
But local-government reform is just a pretext for upping the stakes in the struggle for political influence and economic resources. In Kabardino-Balkaria, the flashpoint was the status of Elbrus and distribution of the revenues it brings in. The problem in Karachai-Circassia was the status of the republic's largest farm, Yuzhny, which is a sizeable contributor to the local budget. The Ingush opposition - supported by some of the losers from the last presidential election - used the painful issue of the conflict with North Ossetia as an extra bargaining chip in negotiations with the regional executive. But nearly all political or economic struggles in the North Caucasus are aggravated by ethnic or clan-based clashes.
Currently, Dagestan is at center-stage. For years, the region's largest ethnic group, the Avars, have been trying to regain the regional leadership from the Dargins. The Avars have recently intensified their activity in anticipation of President Magomedali Magomedov's resignation, hinted at by his recent receiving of the Order for Service to the Fatherland, first class - a rare distinction for a regional leader. Last August, the republic's Interior Ministry faced a revolt from its own municipal department in Khasaviurt, which refused to acknowledge its authority. The department's actions were backed by Khasaviurt's mayor, Saigidpasha Umakhanov, an Avar and the only person to publicly oppose the head of the republic's State Council. Umakhanov also heads the opposition Northern Alliance movement.
The various deepening clan-based and ethnic conflicts in the North Caucasus are exacerbated by inefficiency among the local ruling elites: Southern regions are still among the poorest in Russia, with many of them facing socio-economic catastrophe, and confidence in the authorities is declining.
Presidential representative Kozak described all of this in his report, which stresses the need to break the regional power of the clans and strengthen federal control. Moscow now faces the almost impossible task of solving the systemic crisis in a stepwise fashion without disrupting the current fragile balances, thereby preventing the escalation of conflict in the region.
Tatyana Stanovaya is a senior analyst at the Center for Political Technologies.
