h.kanbolat@todayszaman.com
HASAN KANBOLAT
January 14, 2016, Thursday
The Northern Caucasus in the Turkish-Russian dispute: Sisyphus
In Greek mythology, Sisyphus was a king condemned to spend his afterlife trying to roll an enormous boulder to the peak of a giant hill, only to watch it roll back down over and over again for eternity. Perhaps the people of the Northern Caucasus are in a Sisyphus-like situation, in that they have taken so many steps through the years to see their region normalized, only to watch all the progress go backward again.
After the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the multidimensional improvement in Turkish-Russian ties meant that the Northern Caucasus region stopped being an area of tension between these two countries, and transformed, instead, into an important bridge region for closer relations between Moscow and Ankara. At this time, reciprocal trust, closer ethnic ties and trade and investment all increased.
Most lately, though, in the wake of the Nov. 24, 2015 downing of a Russian jet by Turkish forces, it has been the Northern Caucasus (Adygea, Chechnya, Dagestan, Ingushetia, Kabardino-Balkaria, Karachay-Cherkessia, Krasnodar, Stavropol, Ossetia, Rostov-on-Don) and Abkhazia that have been the most dramatically impacted. In fact, all the gains that were made concerning these two regions began to disappear after Nov. 24. Once again, the Northern Caucasus has begun to be targeted and identified with terrorism. Most Turkish citizens with roots in this region believed as friendly relations with Russia developed, human relations would, too. And so, seeing the Northern Caucasus targeted by Moscow after the jet incident sparked great disappointment among people from the Northern Caucasus. In the meantime, the carefully cultivated relations between Turkey and this region have also been severely damaged.
Forced mass migrations from the Northern Caucasus to the Ottoman state took place after 1864; similar waves of migration from Abkhazia to Ottoman lands took place after the 1877-78 Ottoman-Russian War. In the meantime, there are now around 7 million Turkish citizens with roots that stretch to the Northern Caucasus. Today, there are certain ethnic peoples of the Northern Caucasus that have higher numbers in Turkey than in the region itself (like the Circassians, Abkhazians and the Ubykhians).
One day before the Nov. 29, 2015 Ankara Caucasus Foundations Federation (Kafeed) congress, there was supposed to be a meeting of the World Circassian Union. But the meeting was cancelled when the delegates were unable to make it to Turkey from the Caucasus.
Meanwhile, professors working at Düzce University’s department of language and literature from the Caucasus languages and cultures section were forcibly called back to Russia by Moscow in December 2015. At the same time, the 300-or-so Turkish students studying at universities throughout the Northern Caucasus region were beginning to be harassed. Adigey State University, in Maykop, Russia, has cut all ties with Turkey. Both Kafeed and the Federation of Abkhaz Associations (Abhazfed) have met with Moscow’s ambassador to Ankara, Andrey Karlov, to express worries about the fast deteriorating Turkish-Russian relations and the effect this could have not only on trade relations but academic relations as well. Ambassador Karlov was reportedly warm and constructive in his comments during these meetings.
The Russian Federation put a stop to direct flights between Turkey and the Northern Caucasus. Contrary to the laws of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), Moscow demanded visas from flight crews on Turkish planes coming into the region starting on Jan. 1. Visa applications, however, were not responded to after this. Pegasus Airlines stopped its flights from Istanbul to Moscow and Krasnodar until Jan. 13, while Onur Air stopped its direct flights from Istanbul to Nalchik until Jan. 14.
