MINELRES: Caucasus Reporting Service No. 228: Abaza - North Caucasian minority

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WELCOME TO IWPR'S CAUCASUS REPORTING SERVICE, No. 228, April 21, 2004.

CAUCASUS NEWS UPDATE APRIL 21

AZERBAIJAN UNDER PRESSURE ON TRAFFICKING Hundreds of Azerbaijani women
are being trafficked each year and the scale of the problem is only now
becoming evident. By Khadija Ismailova in Baku

LOYALTY BATTLE PARALYSES GEORGIAN PORT Local politicians compete with
one another to express loyalty to President Saakashvili. By Irakly
Lagvilava in Poti

THE SLOW VANISHING OF THE ABAZA Is it too late to save the culture and
language of a North Caucasian minority? By Fatima Tlisova in Elburgan

ARMENIAN GAYS GET ORGANISED A self-help group is a tentative step
towards getting society to recognise homosexuals. By Zhanna Alexanian in
Yerevan

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.....................

THE SLOW VANISHING OF THE ABAZA

Is it too late to save the culture and language of a North Caucasian
minority?

By Fatima Tlisova in Elburgan

"The forest is dying along with our people." An elderly forestry worker
with heavily veined hands has a contemplative and resigned expression on
his face as he says these words. 

The forest in question is next to the village or "aul" of Elburgan, not
far from Cherkessk, the capital of Karachai-Cherkessia at the foot of
the Caucasus mountains. The ancient woods are being felled for timber,
while the local Abaza people are slowly losing their identity and
culture.
 
Ramazan Kamov, the elder of Elburgan - the second largest Abaza village
- laments the fact that only three children were born there over the
last year. "What kind of future are we leaving for our children? I can't
see the Abaza people existing in the future, and that hurts me so much!
We keep waiting for someone to come and save us, but these are vain
hopes. 

"To survive, we must fight and set all the alarm bells ringing. But
instead we are already losing heart."

The main reason the modern-day Abazas are losing their identity is
because few of them speak their native language, especially in the
towns. In villages, the older generation continues to speak Abaza, but
for those under 30 years old, Russian is now the main means of
communication. 

Mukhamed Tkhaitsukhov, a well-known Abaza writer, fears it may already
be too late. "In 20 years time at the most, we will cease to exist as a
nation, as an ethnic group. In Abaza schools in the auls, education will
be conducted entirely in Russian. There will be no more speakers of the
language left, and thus no nation! Somewhere up there they are passing
laws about us, but only a faint echo of that reaches us, and we see no
practical action. We are knocking on the doors of various officials, but
to no avail."

Albert Jandubayev, the headmaster at a school in the village of
Inzhich-Chukun, 45 kilometres from Cherkessk, said that the Abaza
language needs direct support from the authorities if it is to survive.

 "Any changes to the curriculum on the ground require additional funding
- extra jobs for teachers or at least extra pay for their overtime," he
explained. "But even if a village school headmaster is prepared to bear
such expenses on his meagre school budget, there is no guarantee that
his initiative will get approval from the top. That's why it is such a
problem for the Abazas to learn their native language." 

Karachai-Cherkessia, one of the most diverse regions of the Russian
Federation, is home to about 16 ethnic groups. According to the
republic's constitution, five of them have the status of "indigenous
nationalities" - Russians, Karachais, Circassians (or Cherkess), Abazas
and Nogais. 

Abazas have been listed in the "Red Book," a list of endangered "peoples
of the Russian Empire" compiled by Estonian scholars. But this has had
no practical impact on their life.

The Abaza are an indigenous people of the north-western Caucasus,
related to the Abkhaz and the Circassians but quite distinct from them.
Their language most resembles the tongue of the Ubykh ethnic group, the
last speaker of which died in Turkey in 1992.

In the 18th century, the Abaza had a large population, according to
accounts from European travellers in the Caucasus. They lived by raising
livestock and were famous for their herds of pedigree horses. After the
end of the devastating Caucasian wars in the 1860s, the Red Book
records, the Abazas, along with their more numerous Circassian cousins,
were subjected to mass deportation to the Ottoman Empire, and only 9,000
out of 50,000 remained in their homeland.

Nowadays, according to statistical data, the Abaza population in Russia
numbers around 30,000, almost all of them in Karachai-Cherkessia.

Despite their small numbers, the Abazas are a strong political force in
Karachai-Cherkessia and have been able to influence presidential
elections there. The "Abaza question" was one of the main points in the
election campaigns of both presidents of the republic to date - former
president Vladimir Semenov and the incumbent Mustafa Batdyev. According
to some sources, Abaza criminal networks control almost half the
businesses in Cherkessk, and there are many wealthy Abaza entrepreneurs.

Yet these businessmen are reluctant to support Abaza culture and it
seems there is no effective organisation raising funds on its behalf.

Anatoly Tlyabichev, an Abaza who owns one of the autonomous republic's
most successful businesses, the Rezinotekhnik factory, told IWPR, "Most
often people ask me for one-off help of various kinds, for medical
treatment, publication of a book or self-publicity. No one has ever
applied to me with a real programme to revive the Abaza language and
culture. And even if such a programme appears, there is no guarantee
that the money will be spent as intended. That is why I prefer to give
direct assistance to specific recipients."

The state shows almost no interest in addressing the issue. Neither the
federal authorities in Moscow nor the republican authorities in
Cherkessk are investing money in the cultural survival of small ethnic
groups. 

The Abaza leaders were encouraged by a federal law in 1999 and a
republican law in 2001, both of which promised to protect the rights of
small indigenous peoples. But 
Shchors Chagov, the chairman of the Abaza society, said their initial
hopes were disappointed. "Neither the budget for 2003, nor the budget
for 2004 on the federal or regional level have provided funding in the
framework of this law on small nations," he said.

Another problem for the Abaza is that they have no single political
centre in Karachai-Cherkessia, and their villages are located in
different administrative districts.

Local parliamentary deputy Uali Evgamukov is an Abaza who spent many
years in the United State and still owns a dancing school in Miami. He
says he returned to his homeland to "help revive the economy, attract
investment and develop links with American businesses". But he is
discouraged by what he found on his return.

Evgamukov said, "I don't see any prospects for young people, they don't
yet exist in our republic. Nor do they exist for our nation. We have no
clearly defined administrative territorial centre." 

A plan to create a single Abaza district has long been under discussion,
he said, but nothing has been done. President Batdyev blamed budgetary
problems for the failure to implement the change, but other officials
say they are afraid of a potential spate of land claims.

In the Abaza villages, all this is barely a topic of conversation, as
people worry about unemployment and earning their daily bread.
	
Fatima Tlisova is a freelance journalist in Karachai-Cherkessia.

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ISSN: 1477-7959 Copyright (c) 2004 The Institute for War & Peace
Reporting 

CAUCASUS REPORTING SERVICE No. 228