Assessment for Lezgins in Russia

View Group Chronology

Risk Assessment | Analytic Summary | References

Risk Assessment

Although many feared that Lezgin demands for the creation of an independent "Lezgistan" would destabilize the fragile ethnic balance in Dagestan as well as relations between Russia and Azerbaijan, these fears have thus far proved to be unwarranted. By 2006 it appears less likely than ever that the Lezgins will resort to rebellion or sustained collective political action to address their grievances. They did not engage in any serious violence or protests between 1997 and 2006, and have shown a willingness to negotiate and compromise away their most intractable demands. Their nationalist movements do not receive wide support among the Lezgin people who are not well-organized on the grass-roots level, and who certainly do not want Dagestan to suffer the same fate as Chechnya.

One potentially destabilizing factor is the struggling economy of the Lezgin regions. The Lezgin are among the most disadvantaged of the Dagestani groups, and there appears to be little effort to rectify the situation on the part of local officials. Sources report that unemployment among young Dagestani Lezgins is as much as 80%, due largely to the collapse of both the defense industry that was concentrated in their region and traditional Lezgin sheep herding. One suspects that these figures may be exaggerated, or that many Lezgins are supporting themselves in the "unofficial economy" that still thrives across the former Soviet Union. But if those unemployment numbers are close to reality, such large numbers of unemployed people in comparison to other groups may prove to be a tremendously destabilizing factor in the long run.

The wars in Chechnya have had opposing effects on the Lezgins. On the one hand, the wars exacerbated the main Lezgin grievance, as the Samur River became a virtual wall dividing their people between Russia and Azerbaijan. However, the ferocity of the fighting seems to have discouraged militant Lezgins by convincing them (and many other Caucasian groups) that Moscow is determined to maintain a firm hold on its territories. Lezgin leaders seem to have concluded that the best route to change is a peaceful one. Of course the Lezgin grievances could be largely satisfied if the Russian government relaxes the tight border controls on the Samur.

The Lezgins in Dagestan seem to understand the fragility of the ethnic balance in their republic. In the last few years even the most ardent Lezgin nationalists have softened their demands. This recognition that their interest lies in peaceful social change bodes well for the prospects for stability in the region.

top

Analytic Summary

The Lezgins are a Sunni Muslim people whose lands are divided by the international border between two countries – Russia and Azerbaijan (BELIEF = 2). In Russia, the Lezgins are concentrated in southern Dagestan (GROUPCON = 3), which is one of the most diverse regions of the world. The term "Lezgin" was once used by outsiders to refer to all of the ethnic groups of Dagestan, but today it correctly refers only to the people who refer to themselves as "Lezghi" and share a strong group identity .The history of this group probably began with the merger of various indigenous groups of the Caucasus early in the last millennium. The Lezgin language is part of the Caucasus family of languages and includes three distinct dialects, although virtually all Lezgins also speak Russian as a second language (LANG = 1).

Throughout most of the Soviet era, the Lezgins were subjected to various cultural manipulations. Moscow went through periods of promoting Arabic and Turkic as the "official" cultures and languages, as well as a period of promoting the diversity of the region. However, shortly after World War II Soviet authorities began to impose Russian as the only language of choice in schools and government offices. These manipulations only irritated the anti-Russian feelings of most Lezghi and they resisted Russification by the Soviets just as they had under the czars. To this day, Lezgins still share a profound distaste for and distrust of Russians.

According to the 2002 Russian census, there were 411,000 Lezgins in Russia, over 85 percent of whom live in Dagestan. By far the largest grievance that the Lezgins have against the government in Moscow is what they see as the artificial division of their lands that occurred when the Soviet Union collapsed. The nominal border between Soviet Socialist Republics along the Samur River became an international border in 1991.. Movement for the Lezgins was still more-or-less free until 1994, when the Russian government tightened border controls, after the outbreak of hostilities in Chechnya, in order to try to stop Islamic guerillas and military supplies from the Middle East from reaching the break-away republic.

This division did more to the Lezgins than simply cause an inconvenience. For centuries free passage over the Samur was necessary for the survival of the Lezgin sheep-herders, who would bring their flocks to graze in Dagestan for the summer and spend the winter in Azerbaijan. The flocks were decimated by the inability to migrate. Many of the traditional Lezgin burial grounds are in Azerbaijan. In addition, the forests and fields north of the Samur now receive far less water than they did before the end of the water-sharing regime that existed before the split, which has led to widespread environmental degradation. These problems aggravated an already difficult situation for the Lezgins of Russia, who suffer from high rates of unemployment and poverty compared with the rest of the country (ECDIS06 = 2).

The Sadval (Unity) movement was formed in 1990 to press for unification of the Lezgin territories in Dagestan and Azerbaijan, and they later (in 1991) began to call for a nation-state "formation" for the Lezgins (implying that less than full independence would be acceptable). In 1991, another Lezgin movement, "Samur", was formed in Baku to press against the unification of Lezgins into a single sovereign unit, preferring to cultivate ties across the borders as they presently exist. Both movements primarily seek the removal of the tight border controls between Dagestan and Azerbaijan, but Sadval has been more willing to resort to acts of violence. Sadval has been blamed for a variety of terrorist actions in both Dagestan and Azerbaijan in the 1990s, although no such action has been reported since the late 1990s.

More recently, Lezgin nationalism has been experiencing a “calm period”. The militant activities of the Sadval movement never had much popular support, and now violence seems to be even less of an option. In 1998, Sadval held a congress in which the party split: the moderate wing demands include an open border between Dagestan and Azerbaijan, securing cultural rights for Lezgins in Azerbaijan, improving the ecological situation north of the Samur, and demands for an autonomous region for Lezgins within Dagestan; the radical wing demands a "Lezgistan" formed outside Dagestan but still within the Russian Federation, while maintaining a long-term goal of unification with the Lezgins in Azerbaijan (POLGR06 = 4). One of Sadval’s co-chairmen, Nasyr Primov, stated in a 2004 interview that the organization’s goal was to “unite the Lezgin nation…our only desire, our dream if you like, is to unite the entire Lezgin people in one state.” However, it appears that neither faction is militant, with no reports of violence or protests against the Russian state in recent years (REB00-06 = 0; PROT01-06 = 0).

top

References

Barrett, Thomas M. "The Remaking of the Lion of Dagestan: Shamil in Captivity." The Russian Review Vol. 53 (July 1994), pp. 353-366.

Bremmer, Ian and Ray Taras, eds. Nations and Politics in the Soviet Successor States (NY: Cambridge University Press) 1993.

The British Broadcasting Corp. Summary of World Broadcasts.

Cheterian, Vicken. "Tricky Ethnic Balance in Dagestan." Swiss Review of World Affairs, October 1994, pp. 25-26.

Current Digest of the Post-Soviet Press.

Fuller, Elizabeth. "Caucasus: The Lezgin Campaign for Autonomy." RFE/RL Research Report Vol. 1, No. 41 (October 1992), pp. 30-32.

Fuller, Liz, “Russia: New Potential Ethno-Territorial Flashpoints Emerge In Daghestan” RFE/RL By Country/Russia (02/03/06);http://www.rferl.org/content/article/1065402.html

Jamestown Foundation Eurasia Daily Monitor, Chechnya Weekly (various issues).

Lexis-Nexis: All News Files 1995-2006.

Monitor. A daily digest published by the Jamestown Foundation.

Olson, James S. ed. An Ethnohistorical Dictionary of the Russian and Soviet Empires (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press) 1994.

Ormrod, Jane. "The North Caucasus: fragmentation or federation?" In Bremmer and Taras (eds.), Nations and Politics in the Soviet Successor States.

Open Media Research Institute. Daily Reports.

Prava Cheloveka v Rossii, "Prava Cheloveka v Regionakh Rossiskoi Federatsii Respublika Dagestan" 2002 Report

(http://www.hro.org/docs/reps/2001/dagestan/index.htm -- accessed 03.01.04).

Prism. A weekly electronic journal published by the Jamestown Foundation.

Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty. Daily Reports (various, to 2006).

"Report on Ethnic Conflict in the Russian Federation and Transcaucasia." From the Strengthening Democratic Institutions Project at the John F. Kennedy School of Government (July 1993).

Richter, Anthony. "The Perils of 'Sustainable Empire." Transition (OMRI 15 March 1995) Vol. 1 (3): 14 - 15.

Sheehy, Ann. "Dagestani Muslims Protest against Cost of Pilgrimage to Mecca." Report on the USSR, June 28, 1991, pp. 26-28.

Shenfield, Stephen D. The Potential for Genocide in the Caucasus. A paper presented at the First Meeting of the Association of Genocide Scholars, College of William and Mary, June 14-16, 1995.

Smith, Graham, ed. The Nationalities Question in the Soviet Union (New York: The Longman Group) 1990.

Young, Stephen, Ronald J. Bee and Bruce Seymore II. One Nation Becomes Many: The ACCESS Guide to the Former Soviet Union (Washington, DC: ACCESS) 1992.

top