{"id":3344,"date":"2021-06-25T23:25:47","date_gmt":"2021-06-25T23:25:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mediateka.online\/learnrussian\/amid-outrage-abroad-chechen-strongman-kadyrov-lays-the-groundwork-for-a-fourth-term.html"},"modified":"2021-06-25T23:25:47","modified_gmt":"2021-06-25T23:25:48","slug":"amid-outrage-abroad-chechen-strongman-kadyrov-lays-the-groundwork-for-a-fourth-term","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mediateka.online\/learnrussian\/amid-outrage-abroad-chechen-strongman-kadyrov-lays-the-groundwork-for-a-fourth-term.html","title":{"rendered":"Amid Outrage Abroad, Chechen Strongman Kadyrov Lays The Groundwork For A Fourth Term"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ramzan

In February 2016, just weeks before the North Caucasus republic of Chechnya was to hold an election for executive-branch head, incumbent leader Ramzan Kadyrov announced on state television that he had had enough.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy time has passed,\u201d he said. \u201cThere are lots of successors on our team. We have got very good specialists.\u201d<\/p>\n

Far from being the end of Kadyrov\u2019s notorious run as the region\u2019s strongman, the announcement was actually the start of an elaborate campaign to beg him to remain in power. It featured videos of weeping women and children and a statement from the region\u2019s rights ombudsman to the effect that Kadyrov\u2019s resignation would amount to a violation of the rights of every Chechen.<\/p>\n

\u201cSociety sees no alternative to [Kadyrov], and there can be no talk of successors,\u201d read a statement by a previously unknown group called the Civic Forum of the Chechen Republic.<\/p>\n

The Kremlin-backed Kadyrov changed his mind — if in fact he had intended to bow out — and managed to whip up a last-minute formal campaign. According to the official result, he won a third term with 98 percent of the vote — an outcome that government critics change was influenced by fraud and pressure on the populace to back him.<\/p>\n

Now that term is coming to an end, and the political theater is returning. When Russia goes to the polls for national legislative elections on September 17-19, Chechens will vote for a republic head. And Kadyrov appears poised to claim another term despite his long record of human rights abuses, including what Human Rights Watch called \u201cegregious cases of torture, public humiliation, enforced disappearances, and extrajudicial killings.\u201d<\/p>\n

People tied to Kadyrov have been convicted of involvement or implicated in the killings of investigative journalist Anna Poltikovskaya, human rights activist Natalya Estimirova, former Russian Deputy Prime Minister and opposition political leader Boris Nemtsov, and others.<\/p>\n

\"'I

No media source currently available<\/p>\n

0:00 0:02:32 0:00 <\/p>\n

On June 23, Grozny hosted a Global Congress of the Peoples of Chechnya, a half-day forum that brought together 5,000 delegates from 23 countries, despite only being announced at the beginning of the week.<\/p>\n

The congress boasted delegates from Turkey, France, Germany, Belgium, and other countries, although none of the Chechen diaspora organizations contacted by RFE\/RL had advance notice of the congress or sent representatives.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo one selected these delegates,\u201d said Aslan Murtazaliyev, head of the Association of Chechens of Europe. \u201cThey are phantoms, and no one here knows them\u2026. Our association has chapters in many countries in Europe and we would never send to a Kadyrov event.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRamzan [Kadyrov] is the only candidate for the post of head of the Chechen Republic,\u201d proclaimed State Duma Deputy Adam Delimkhanov at the event.<\/p>\n

‘In The Name Of All The Clans, All The Villages’<\/p>\n

A man named Ali Bazhayev, who claimed to be the vice president of a group called the Alliance of Chechens in France, seconded the nomination \u201cin the name of all Chechens in France.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 79-year-old Ruslan Khasbulatov, who was chairman of the Russian Supreme Soviet until his standoff against President Boris Yeltsin in October 1993, also called on Chechens to vote for Kadyrov.<\/p>\n

After the delegates finished lunch, they formed a procession headed by the republic\u2019s chief mufti, Salakh Mezhiyev, and made their way to Kadyrov\u2019s residence to urge him \u201cin the name of all the clans, all the villages, and all the respected figures of Islam\u201d to heed their call \u201cnot to abandon them on this path.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mezhiyev then personally handed Kadyrov a copy of the congress\u2019s unanimous resolution. Analysts said the event was hastily organized to present the resolution just moments before Kadyrov\u2019s video conference with President Vladimir Putin that afternoon. Putin praised Kadyrov\u2019s handling of the regional economy and urged him to run for another term \u201cto continue your work.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor my part, I wish you only success,\u201d Putin said.<\/p>\n

Human Rights Watch said that Putin\u2019s assertion that Chechnya under Kadyrov is \u201cone of the safest places\u201d in Russia was \u201cparticularly cynical.\u201d Just two days earlier, the head of Chechen state television threatened to kill Kadyrov\u2019s critics.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf someone needs to be killed, someone who deserves death, then we will kill,\u201d Chingiz Akhmadov said in a video on Instagram, adding that any \u201cenemy of Ramzan Kadyrov is an enemy of the Chechen people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kadyrov, 44, virtually inherited the post of head of Chechnya after his father, Chechen President Akhmed Kadyrov, was assassinated in 2004. After a spell as prime minister, Kadyrov was appointed Chechen president by Putin in 2007. He was given a second term by then-President Dmitry Medvedev in 2011 and a unanimous vote by the region\u2019s legislature. During that term, the post of Chechen \u201cpresident\u201d was abolished and Kadyrov has since been \u201chead\u201d of the Chechen republic.<\/p>\n

Written by RFE\/RL senior correspondent Robert Coalson based on reporting by correspondent Pyotr Sevryuk of the Caucasus.Realities desk of RFE\/RL\u2019s North Caucasus Service <\/p>\n