When Yunas-Bek Yevkurov replaced Murat Zyazikov as president of Ingushetia in 2008 most citizens of the troubled republic were greatly relieved. Yevkurov arrived as a determined bridge-builder, a man of consensus who was expected to appeal to the disaffected citizenry of Ingushetia. He quickly won praise for pledging to put a stop to the much-maligned practice whereby young men were routinely abducted by unidentified members of the security forces. Of late, however, Yevkurov has seemingly revised his attitude toward Ingushetia’s kidnapping phenomenon – and his reached some startling conclusions.

BACKGROUND: Not long after assuming the presidency of Ingushetia, it became apparent to most observers that Yunas-Bek Yevkurov had been sent to his homeland as a conciliator. Yevkurov at once established a dialogue with his predecessor’s main opponents: Maksharip Aushev, Magomed Khazbiyev and Musa Pliyev. These three human rights activists, the leading representatives of the anti-Zyazikov coalition, welcomed Yevkurov’s appointment and expressed their shared conviction that the new president was capable of improving the situation in Ingushetia.

Pliyev, a lawyer by profession, was made an advisor to Yevkurov, while another well-known human rights advocate, Magomed-Sali Aushev, was made a deputy prime minister. In addition, Yevkurov appointed Rashid Gaisanov, an associate of the popular former president of the republic, Ruslan Aushev, to head his new government.

Yevkurov condemned the capricious behaviour of Ingushetia’s security forces; he also insisted that no ‘special operations’ take place on the territory of Ingushetia without his government’s knowledge. He met with representatives of local non-governmental human rights organisations such as ‘Mashr’; he proposed the establishment of an ad hoc presidential committee which would respond promptly to reported human rights violations and established a telephone ‘hotline’ through which citizens might report abuses by local police. This frenetic activity, in particular the president’s efforts to tackle instances of kidnapping, earned him fulsome praise from Lyudmila Alexseeva, chairperson of the Moscow Helsinki Group, a Russian human rights organisation.

Speaking in December 2008, Alexseeva specifically applauded the president’s habit of personally visiting the locations of reported kidnappings where he interacts with the victim’s relatives, offering them personal and institutional support. Yevkurov’s early hands-on approach to such cases was corroborated by a relative of Gapur Tankiyev, abducted from the settlement of Malgobek by unidentified gunmen last April. ‘The president said that he was willing to support us in our search in every way. In particular, he offered assistance in providing [media] coverage…the president also promised that he would monitor the progress of our cause. He also recommended a good lawyer to us,’ said Tankiyev’s brother.

While Yevkurov’s personal intervention in these situations may have given a degree of psychological comfort to anguished family members, it has done little to expedite the successful resolution of such cases in general. If anything, by associating himself personally with cases of abduction the president has enfeebled himself politically by virtue of the fact that neither he, nor the security forces he is responsible for, have managed to produce positive results in cases of this nature. Indeed, this uncomfortable reality was recently pointed by the head of Mashr, Magomed Mutsolgov. Yevkurov’s atypical reaction to the abduction of Mikhail Pliyev, an Ingush citizen abducted in Pyatigorsk, Stavropol Krai, in early March, may be indicative of a change of attitude on the president’s part toward cases of abduction.  

IMPLICATIONS: In August 2009, Yevkurov stated that many reported kidnappings in Ingushetia were in fact cases where young men had left their homes to join the ranks of the militants. Without saying so forthrightly, Yevkurov inferred that many young men were vanishing of their own accord, sometimes even staging their own abductions so as to shield their families from reprisals by security forces. He called on such persons to accept his government’s offer of amnesty and to return to a peaceful existence.

In January of this year Yevkurov went further, announcing that 90% of abductees are ‘members and accomplices of illegal armed groups’. Although the figure of 90% seems suspiciously rounded, there may be more than a kernel of truth in this suggestion. It is nevertheless curious that the president had not expressed this sentiment prior to August 2009; or perhaps more relevantly, prior to June 22, 2009, when he was critically injured during a suicide bomb attack on his presidential motorcade.

Yevkurov’s seemingly newfound belief that a clear majority of abductees are in fact militants would appear have influenced his handling of the case of Mikhail Pliyev, missing since the beginning of March. Yevkurov’s behaviour towards the Pliyev family has been peculiar. Mr. Pliyev’s wife told reporters how the president said to her, almost admonishingly: ‘you must know who your man is involved with’. She also protested that there appeared to be no official investigation underway. ‘A lot of things have been promised, but nothing has been done,’ she complained. In addition to his curious encounter with Mrs. Pliyev, Yevkurov also prohibited a planned public demonstration organised by the Pliyev family, reportedly informing relatives that he would not permit ‘illegal rallies’ and telling them to ‘go home’.

Even allowing for some understandable emotional embellishment in the family members’ retelling of their encounter with Yevkurov, it is certain that the president disallowed the planned protest march and that police were deployed to disperse the demonstrators. Yevkurov’s dispute with the Pliyev family represents the first time in his presidency that he has come into conflict with representatives of Ingush society that to our knowledge are involved neither with the state apparatus, nor with the militant underground. Yevkurov’s current thinking on the abduction phenomenon is governed by the conviction that ‘nothing happens of itself’; that there are reasons why people are taking up arms against Ingushetia’s government, and that parents, relatives and clergy are all responsible for steering young people away from the militants.

This line of thinking is predicated on the uncertain premise that the clear majority of ‘abductions’ in Ingushetia are in fact a novel means of familial preservation, a supreme act of social abnegation whereby, in anticipation of taking up arms against the state, a young man wills his own disappearance for the sake of his family’s safety and well-being. In a series of public statements since August 2009, President Yevkurov has confirmed his acceptance of this premise. With this in mind, the controversy surrounding the president’s recent intervention in the Pliyev case might be construed as the manifestation of this assumed premise in the government’s attitude toward families of missing individuals.

CONCLUSIONS: We cannot be certain what exactly led President Yevkurov to accept the premise that nine out of every ten alleged abductees are actually involved with the militants. It is a fact that prior to August 2009 Yevkurov had never referenced the abduction phenomenon publicly along these lines. Is it possible that the June 2009 attack on his presidential convoy – an attack in which Yevkurov himself suffered serious injuries, his brother was seriously injured and his cousin killed – encouraged Yevkurov to adopt a less conciliatory stance toward Ingush society at large?

Perhaps this is more a question for a psychologist than a political analyst. Nevertheless, an objective analysis of the president’s statements on the abduction phenomenon since his return to Ingushetia in August 2009, indicate that the attempt on his life represented a definite turning point in Yevkurov’s political outlook. His apparent change of attitude toward cases of abduction also coincided with a marked deterioration in his relationship with representatives of Ingushetia’s human rights community. In light of this apparent change in attitude, Yevkurov may now be disposed toward pursuing a less conciliatory policy toward segments of Ingush society whose favour he previously courted. 

AUTHOR’S BIO: Kevin Daniel Leahy holds a postgraduate degree from University College Cork, Ireland.