See also here; includes this:
In July [2012], Russian security officials announced that for the first six months of the year, through all of the North Caucasus, 194 militants had been killed, along with 104 police officers and 32 civilians. They expressed satisfaction that this represented a decline from the year before.Fisher notes that the Russian approach to these regions has been repression rather than an effort to address underlying grievances. I don't know enough about the Caucasus to comment much; but he might have mentioned what proportion of the population in Dagestan is involved in (or passively supports) violent separatist and/or jihadist activity.
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"the Russian approach to these regions has been repression rather than an effort to address underlying grievances"
Well, color ME surprised.
Yes, shocked, shocked to find repression going on here.
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There may be an interesting question lurking around this point re what an effort to address underlying grievances would, more precisely, consist of. But after two quite brutal wars in Chechnya I'm not sure that, even if the Russian govt did a volte face and decided on a more nicey-nicey policy, any of the relevant parties would trust it. Which means the Russian govt wd have to prob spend a v. long time on smallish confidence-building measures (to use the conflict resolution lingo) before even getting to square one.
(Sorry for all the cliches -- kind of zonked rt now.)
Btw, totally OT:
acc. to the transcript, Scalia in oral argument of a case today (involving conditions on govt funding of NGOs which do anti-AIDS/HIV work in Africa and elsewhere) criticized the verb "to partner," as in "to partner with the federal govt," as "a terrible verb." Once in a while he says something on target.
Grammar and usage may be the only subject on which I would trust Scalia. Actually, his little book with Garner on appellate argument is useful.
... It's difficult to discuss diplomacy without falling into the jargon of diplomats. Remember Talleyrand: "language was created so that men could conceal their thoughts."
I had forgotten that Tallyrand quote.
I'm sure it will come in handy at some pt.
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