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Russia/Chechnya

Initiative for Nonviolence in Russia and Chechnya

£2,800 - Approved October 2008 – Training for Russian and Chechen activists in nonviolence

IPF Local Partners: War Resisters’ International and House of Peace St. Petersburg

IPF Project: An initiative for Nonviolence in Russia and Chechnya

Location: St. Petersburg, Russia

1. Country Background - Chechnya
Chechnya is situated in the eastern part of the North Caucasus, and surrounded on all sides by Russian Federal Territory. In the west, it borders North Ossetia and Ingushetia, in the north, Stavropol Krai, in the east, Dagestan, and to the south, Georgia.

In the late 1940s, Stalin ordered the deportation of the entire Chechen and Ingush population (approximately 50% of the population) to Kazakhstan. The Checheno-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR) was transformed into Grozny Oblast, and parts of it were given to North Ossetia, Georgian SSR and Dagestan ASSR.
In 1957, four years after Stalin's death, the Chechens were allowed to return, but mainly rehabilitated in the rural mountainous area.

With the demise of the Soviet Republic in 1990, Chechnya sought autonomy and independence which it largely achieved. Between 1994 and 1996 Russia sent in military forces to prevent Chechnya from fully seceding, but was unable to establish effective control over the mountainous area, and signed a peace treaty in 1997.

The war cost the lives of over 35,000 Chechen civilians, destroyed the infrastructure and economy and resulted in almost half the civilian population being displaced.

In 1999 Russian launched an offensive which resulted in the eventual fall of the Chechen authorities by 2002.
Since 2002, Russia has begun to rebuild the largely destroyed capital city of Grozny, and in April 2009 it announced an end to the decade long ‘counter terrorism operation’ and that ‘normality’ had returned to Chechnya.
Human right monitoring organizations continue to voice concerns about the absence of the rule of law, free and fair elections, and continuing disappearances of critics of the government. There is also no indication from the governing authorities that cases concerning the 5,000 or so people who disappeared during the 1990s will be investigated.

2. Local Partner – War Resisters’ International (www.wri-irg.org)
War Resisters' International (WRI) was founded in 1921 and exists to promote nonviolent action against the causes of war, and to support and connect people around the world who refuse to take part in war or the preparation of war.
WRI has been involved in providing nonviolence training for over 20 years and has been networking with and supporting international groups committed to nonviolence change for over 40 years.

Local partner – House of Peace St. Petersburg (www.peacehouse.ru/org-en.htm)
The House of Peace and Non-Violence (HoP) was set up in St. Petersburg at the end of 2002 to ‘develop the culture of peace, tolerance, non-violence, respect and of skills of Human Rights for young people, their parents and teachers.’ Two of the core aims of HoP is to encourage citizens to take responsibility for themselves and for their role in society, and to practice tolerance and understanding through meetings with their opposite numbers.
HoP has developed long-term contacts with Chechen activists working for peace, and since 2005 has carried out a number of initiatives linking young people, and their elders, from St Petersburg, to their peers in both rural Chechnya and Grozny.

3. IPF Grant - Project Details
The project, to be carried out in 2009, is to link 20 young activists from Russia and Chechnya who will commit to a year-long process of work on nonviolence. This work will foster nonviolent ways of working and include nonviolence training, preparation of written training materials in Russian, and the formation of a long-term nonviolence working group.
It is also hoped that this work will create a core group of Russian and Chechen trainers in nonviolence. Through their work, it should also be possible to reduce the amount of violence in the Russian and Chechen activist cultures, as well as widen the discussion of the role that violence plays in their societies.

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