The Strategic Importance and Historical Legacy of the Volga Region
Abbreviations v
Introduction 1
The Strategic Importance and Historical Legacy of the Volga Region 3
Islamism’s Early Warning Signs 8
Salafi Activity in the Volga Region 14
An Examination of Radical and Nonofficial Islamic Groups 21
Searching for an Adequate Reaction 31
About the Author 33
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abbreviations
ABM Anti-Ballistic Missile (Treaty)
ATPC All-Tatar Public Center
DUMES Spiritual Board of Muslims of European Russia and Siberia
(Dukhovnoye upravleniye musul’man Evropeyskoy chasti SSSR i Sibiri)
CSBM Central Spiritual Board of Muslims
CSTO Collective Security Treaty Organization
FPS Federal Penitentiary Service
FSB Russian Federal Security Service (Federal'naya sluzhba bezopasnosti)
IRP Islamic Revival Party
NCFD North Caucasian Federal District
RCM Russian Council of Muftis
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VFD Volga Federal District
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introduction
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Caucasus. Terrorist bombings and acts of sabotage in Dagestan, Ingushetia, and Chechnya are per-ceived as somehow intrinsic to the region. But a recent tragedy in the Volga region suggests that this sort of violence—and the Islamist terrorists who perpetrate it—may not be confined to the Caucasus. On the morning of July 19, 2012, simultaneous terrorist attacks wounded the Tatarstan chief mufti, Ildis Faizov, and killed Valiulla Yakupov, the former deputy chairman of the Tatarstan Spiritual Board of Muslims (TSBM), a well-known Islamic theologian and public figure and one of the most consistent opponents of what Russian politicians and media refer to as Wahhabism.1For the first time, o_cial Islamic religious leaders from outside the North Caucasus became victims
of Islamist terrorism. Three months later, the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) announced it had prevented a large-scale terrorist attack in Kazan, the capital of Tatarstan, planned for the eve of the celebration of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha.2Two people killed in the counterterrorist operation had been suspected of the attacks on Faizov and Yakupov as well as other illegal activity.
With these attacks and counterattacks, the problem of inter-Islamic tensions in the Volga region suddenly became real, with some experts drawing attention to a historical parallel: religious and political violence in Dagestan, the largest republic of the North Caucasus, which began inten-sively with the murder of Mufti Sayyid Muhammad Hadji Abubakarov in 1998. Another parallel exists: reacting to the growing Islamist activity in the Caucasus in 1999, the People’s Assembly of Dagestan enacted a law, “On the prohibition of Wahhabism and any other extremist activity,” that recognized all Salafi organizations—which o_cial Muslim clergymen in Dagestan call Wahhabi— as threats to the territorial integrity of the republic, and prohibited the activities of Salafi missions, including their production of audiovisual messages and communications. In 2012, deputies of the Tatarstan State Council reacted in a similar manner, adopting a series of amendments to regional freedom of conscience legislation that explicitly prohibit foreign citizens from establishing reli-gious organizations within the republic. Since the passage of this legislation, only Russian citizens have been allowed to establish such organizations, and candidates for the Islamic clergy must have a diploma from a Russian or o_cially recognized foreign institution attesting to their religious
1. In Russian mass media and public opinion, and even among experts, the concept of Wahhabism is usually interpreted as a nontraditional trend for Russia’s Muslims related to religious radicalism and to Saudi Arabia in particular and foreign influences in general. Among the critics of Wahhabism in the republics of the North Caucasus a special word arose: “Wahhabist,” which they use interchangeably with “terrorist.”
2. Eid al-Adha, also known as Kurban Bayram, is an important religious holiday celebrated by Muslims worldwide to honor the willingness of the prophet Ibrahim (Abraham) to sacrifice his young first-born
son Ismail as an act of submission to God’s will, before God intervened to provide Abraham with a ram to sacrifice instead.
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education.3In both Dagestan and Tatarstan, restrictive mechanisms, fears, and phobias relating to foreign engagement have come to the forefront of policy, supplanting the influence of any other ideology or political bent. As such, the Kazan tragedy has raised a question: How likely is it that the North Caucasus scenario will be repeated in the Volga region, where the recent attacks took place?
Islam in the Volga region is a multidimensional phenomenon, and any attempts to make gen-eralizations about it face methodological di_culties. These problems are compounded by ambigui-ties inherent in the terms “Islamism,” “militant Islam,” or “radical Muslims.” Each term, in its own way, refers to ideology and practice aimed at creating an environment in which all of the problems and contradictions of a Muslim community will be resolved exclusively with Islamic norms pre-scribed by shari’a, the system of regulations derived directly from the Qur’an and Sunnah. Unfor-tunately, those who consider themselves defenders of “real Islam” or “pure Islam” do not constitute a homogenous group, and each claims that its interpretation is the only correct religion.4
In contrast to the Northern Caucasus, however, Islam in the Volga region exhibits a differ-ent character. Although Salafis, who are frequently labeled “Wahhabis” by the Russian media and in political discourse, are active in the Volga region, the area is a remote periphery where several well-known international Islamist groups—such as the Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami (the Islamic Party
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of these Muslims in the region.6The extent to which they are militant is also unclear. Observers and human rights activists claim that Islamist activists are sometimes victims of false allegations that they are connected to international terrorist networks.7Nevertheless, these movements can be
3. Full texts of two those laws are available at http://www.kavkaz-uzel.ru/articles/9315/ (Dagestan) and http://www.rg.ru/2012/08/03/tatarstan-zakon-sovest-reg-dok.html (Tatarstan).
4. Alexander Ignatenko, “Chistil’shchiki Islama” [The Islam cleaners], http://religion.ng.ru/ problems/2010-11-17/1_islam.html.
5. Unlike followers of Hizb ut-Tahrir, Salafis reject political parties on the principle that Islam itself is more important than any parties; Salafis generally decry Hizb ut-Tahrir for engaging with the West and for peaceful rhetoric addressed to the peaceful methods.
6. Rais Suleimanov claimed about three thousand Tatar Wahhabis “are waiting in the wings”; see Ivan Kirichenko, “3000 Tatarskih wahhabitov zhdut svoego chasa” [Three thousand Tatar Wahhabis are waiting in the wings], August 7, 2012, http://svpressa.ru/society/article/57617/. Volga theologian Farid Salman says this number “is probably far too low”; see “Russia and Islam: The end of peaceful coexistence?” The Economist, September 1, 2012, http://www.economist.com/node/21561947. Russian journalist Maxim Shevchenko doubted those figures, naming them mythical and “rather provocative”; see “Wahhabitsii myatezh v respublike Tatarstan: pro i contra” [The Wahhabi rebellion in the Republic of Tatarstan: for and against], August 9, 2012, http://business-gazeta.ru/article/64349/.
7. See the observation of “Memorial” human rights center, http://www.hrights.ru/text/b23/Chapter1%202. htm. It is important to note that human rights activists and journalists generally stress formal judicial mistakes, disproportionate use of force by law-enforcement structures, and violations of procedural norms. They recognize that religious radicalism and extremism exist, but they view human rights and procedural violations as provoking radicalization.
2 |the rise of radical and nonofficial islamic groups in russia’s volga region
united under the term “nono_cial Muslims,” because they do not follow Russia’s o_cially recog-nized Muslim structures, are not registered as o_cial religious groups, and are considered illegal, extremist organizations under Russian law.
This paper sheds light on the ideological sources and resources of radicalism in the Volga region, nono_cial Islamic movements’ support among the regional population, and opportunities for the potential growth of different forms of Islamist activities. It describes the origins of different nono_cial Islamic movements as well as their post-Soviet development, ideology, and relationship with the authorities and o_cial Muslim clergy. The report also offers practical approaches both for Russian domestic policy and for the U.S.–Russian security cooperation agenda.
The Strategic Importance and Historical Legacy of the Volga Region
Before May 2000, the region now known as the Volga Federal District (VFD) was known as the Volga, Volga-Ural, or Volga region. The VFD comprises 14 of Russia’s 83 subyekt federatsii (Federal subjects), specifically the ones located directly on the Volga River or in adjacent areas in the Kama and Ural River basins that are closely associated with the Volga either historically or economi-cally. Although the VFD comprises only 6.1 percent of all Russian territory, its population of more than 30 million people constitutes 21.3 percent of Russia’s total—a much higher percentage than the North Caucasian Federal District (NCFD). After the Central Federal District, which includes Moscow, the VFD is the second most populous of Russia’s eight federal districts.