RFE/RL: Why They Flee The North Caucasus
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posted by circassiankama on September, 2009 as ANALYSIS / OPINION
Why They Flee The North Caucasus
Daghestani journalist Malik Akhmedilov was shot dead in broad daylight last month.
September 04, 2009
A 29-year-old Daghestani who gave his name as Muslim recently told RFE/RL's North Caucasus Service of his good fortune.
Three
years ago, he said, he managed to reach a Western European country,
where he requested asylum. While his request was being processed, he
met a woman and started a family, which led to a positive resolution of
his case.
Many other asylum seekers from the North Caucasus are
not as fortunate, yet still cling to their dreams of one day
integrating into European society.
The reasons why young
people from the North Caucasus seek asylum in Europe are well-known --
abductions and disappearances; persecution on religious and political
grounds; and even extrajudicial killings. Journalists, human rights
activists, and young people who profess allegiance to branches of Islam
outside the mainstream are most frequently subject to such persecution.
In
August 2009, journalist Malik Akhmedilov, secretary of the editorial
board of the Avar-language newspaper "Khakikat" (Truth), was shot dead
in broad daylight outside his house in Makhachkala, Daghestan's
capital. His body was found in his car.
The authorities
attempted to deny in the official press that his killing was in any way
connected with politics. They told RFE/RL that "it would be difficult
to describe Akhmedilov's professional and social engagement as
politics," and refused any further comment.
Akhmedilov's
colleagues agreed with that statement, but only up to a point. They
argued that "it would be difficult to describe what happens in
Daghestan as a whole as politics. But when someone who does not claim
to be a politician tries to stand up to this lawlessness, that
resistance merits being described as politics more than do the criminal
activities that pass for politics."
Ali Kamalov, the editor in chief of "Khakikat," told the press that Akhmedilov's murder was an act of intimidation.
Akhmedilov
was one of the organizers of a meeting in Makhachkala in June 2008 to
protest the extrajudicial killing during a "counterterror operation" of
Rashid Gazilaliyev, a lecturer at the Daghestan Pedagogical University.
Gazilaliyev was posthumously declared innocent. Participants in that
protest demanded the resignation of then Interior Minister Adilgirey
Magomedtagirov.
Akhmedilov wrote at the time in the paper
"Sogratl," of which he was editor, "If we remain silent, they will
shoot us all one by one…"
RFE/RL's North Caucasus Service has
obtained a copy of a document that, in effect, constitutes a
denunciation to the Interior Ministry of a number of prominent
activists and journalists whom the anonymous author considers should be
investigated. Akhmedilov's name was on that list, although that did not
deter him from referring to it and even publishing an extract from it
in "Sogratl."
Human rights activists and independent journalists
are increasingly convinced that abductions and disappearances in
Daghestan are the direct consequence of such denunciations by
neighbors, colleagues, or acquaintances. The fact that even prominent
personalities cannot avoid becoming victims drives people to seek
asylum abroad.
Daghestan's President Mukhu Aliyev recently cited
statistics showing that over the past 10 years, 80 people have been
abducted in Daghestan, of whom 47 were released and four were found
dead. The whereabouts of the remaining 29 is not known.
But
those figures can only be considered a very rough estimate, not only
because official data differs significantly from that compiled by human
rights activists, but also because it is not clear whether all those
young people were abducted, or whether some "headed for the forest" to
join the militants or left Russia to seek a better life abroad.
"Some
people who come [to Western Europe] seeking asylum conceal their true
identities," Muslim continued, "because there is a danger that they
might be deported immediately if the Russian consulate confirms
European authorities' request for information about them." So the
incorrect information supplied by asylum seekers only serves to
compound the inaccuracy of the official statistics.
(by Murtuzali Dugrichilov)
http://www.rferl.org/content/Fleeing_The_North_Caucasus/1814681.html
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