Abstract
Former ballroom in Pitsunda, Abkhazia
The 2014 Winter Olympics border a troubled region.
We first visited Abkhazia at the end of 2007. During the Soviet era it was one of the richest regions, a province of Georgia. It attracted millions of tourists. But a bloody civil war in the early 1990s left it in ruins. Some 200,000 Abkhazian live as refugees in Georgia and beyond. The country is empty, which is perhaps one of its most striking features. We returned with a fairy-tale story about this Soviet relic, accompanied by photographs of hotels overgrown with moss, and full of the dreams of the people who live there and those who were driven out in the 90s and hope one day to return. A forgotten paradise on the Black Sea that hardly anyone had heard of.
A month later Vladimir Putin visited Guatemala, where the International Olympic Committee was gathering for an important meeting. In a rousing speech in fluent French and English, Putin made a final bid to bring the Winter Olympics to Russia. ‘Sochi is a unique place,’ he said. ‘On the seashore you can enjoy a fine spring day, but up in the mountains it’s winter.’ His pitch worked: Winter Olympics on the border of the empty country we had just visited, and on the other side of the mountains from violent republics such as Dagestan and Chechnya. This was our reason for starting The Sochi Project, a five-year-long documentary project about the region surrounding Sochi.
Sochi lies on the eastern shore of the Black Sea. From the coast, the narrow strip of land rises quickly to meet the steep peaks of the Caucasus. The mountains act as a natural buffer against the cold of Russia that stretches endlessly behind them. Sochi has a sub-tropical climate. Its pebble beaches are bordered by tea plantations, tangerine and palm trees. The coastline is dominated by large hotels and sanatoriums that overflow during the long summers with tourists from across Russia – few foreigners come here. On the long boulevards, the noise of Russian chansons mixes with the smell of sweat, shashlik and sun cream. Sochi is Russia’s summer capital. Despite the proximity of Abkhazia and the North Caucasus, this area has been untouched by war and violence. Ask any Russian whether Sochi is in the Caucasus and he will deny it. Sochi is a different entity. It represents that first holiday romance and summer fun. The Caucasus represents bombings, violence, backwardness perhaps, folklore and good food. The Caucasus stands for the wild, hairy men you wouldn’t want to meet in a dark alley in Moscow.
Perhaps it does not matter whether Sochi is in the Caucasus or not. But it is likely that Sochi will soon have to face facts. An attack on Putin’s prestige project would be the crowning glory for the separatists from the North Caucasus. FSB chief Alexander Bortnikov expressed concerns back in 2010 about the security situation surrounding the Games. Earlier bombings in the Moscow subway and airport, and the hostage crises in Beslan and Dubrovka Theatre, were evidence that the terrorists could operate with apparent ease far from home. How easy would it be for them to attack an Olympic target on their doorstep?
Khava Gaisanova, whose husband was kidnapped by unknown men in the North Ossetian capital Vladikavkaz. Because there were no eyewitnesses to the crime, no trial took place
Khava Gaisanova and her family, including her husband
After separatists threatened Isita Isaeva, aged 28, and her husband, they went to the police. But the police accused her husband of a series of murders and only allowed prison visits after he confessed to the crimes. He has now been in prison for 14 years
It was clear that this region would change dramatically between 2007 and 2014. Sochi would be transformed from a resort town to a winter capital – no mean feat in itself. But observers were also curious to see how Moscow would address the instability in its backyard. What to do about Abkhazia and the North Caucasus?
The first problem was solved surprisingly quickly. In early August 2008, war broke out between Georgia and Russia. Tensions that had simmered for years over Georgia and its breakaway provinces Abkhazia and South Ossetia, and between the Kremlin and Saakashvili’s government in Georgia, escalated into a five-day war. At the end of August, President Medvedev recognised both provinces as countries. It was an unexpected move. Russia had always been opposed to recognising Kosovo because it was itself faced with Chechnya, Dagestan and Ingushetia. And now it was recognising Georgia’s Kosovos? However, the decision brought calm to this part of the Caucasus. The United Nations was expelled from Abkhazia and the region came under Russian military control. Sochi no longer bordered a conflict zone, but – in Russia’s eyes at least – a recognised country. Russian border troops now guard not only the Russian border directly adjacent to the Olympics, but also the Abkhazian border with Georgia 200 kilometres to the south.
The Russian government is still working on a solution to the second problem. Billions of roubles from the Kremlin are propping up the regimes in the North Caucasus, the aim being to remove support for the Islamic-inspired terrorist and separatist movements by providing employment and economic development. Alexander Khloponin has been appointed Special Envoy to the North Caucasus. In recent years he has launched fantastic initiatives, including the construction of five ski resorts in the region. The separatists responded by killing a busload of Russian tourists near the slopes of Elbrus, Europe’s highest mountain, and sabotaging ski lifts. A prolonged battle between separatists and security forces in the snow on the border with Dagestan and Chechnya last February was proclaimed on a rebel website as training for Sochi 2014.
The average unemployment rate in the North Caucasus is 50 per cent. Moscow finances up to 91 per cent of the budgets of the North Caucasian republics. In Kabardino-Balkaria, Ingushetia and Dagestan, violence has increased to such an extent it almost qualifies as civil war. During our visits to the areas, it also seemed to us as if support for the separatists is increasing rather than decreasing. The desperate situation there is not the only cause. Nowhere in Russia are human rights as violated as in the North Caucasus. Human rights organisations such as Memorial have their hands full defending young men wrongly convicted of having terrorist links. The European Court of Human Rights is almost swamped by cases brought against the Russian government by families whose sons or fathers have been kidnapped by security forces. In Moscow, we visited safe houses where Chechen women, fearing death at the hands of their husbands or brothers if family honour was at stake, hide before fleeing to Western Europe. Russia appears so far to have been unable to improve the situation. In Dagestan, a rape case is currently being heard in which the alleged perpetrators were given legal assistance by the police. When the president of Dagestan himself became involved in the case, it seemed justice had run its course. At the eleventh hour, the defendants’ lawyers succeeded in getting the girl to drop the rape charge. ‘If you pay a lot of money to the police and prosecutor you can have a charge dropped,’ a young woman in Dagestan told us. Her husband is serving a 14-year prison sentence. She does not have the money. ‘In our villages young men are faced with a diabolical choice. You are either threatened by the police, or you are threatened by the separatists.’
All of Russia’s problems come together in the North Caucasus: corruption, a lack of democracy and gross human rights violations. It is perhaps particularly cynical then that this is the region in which the Winter Olympics are intended to present Russia’s new face to the world.
Captions
All photos © Rob Hornstra/INSTITUTE
Page [2]: Former ballroom in Pitsunda, Abkhazia
Page [4]: Khava Gaisanova, whose husband was kidnapped by unknown men in the North Ossetian capital Vladikavkaz. Because there were no eyewitnesses to the crime, no trial took place
Page [5]: Khava Gaisanova and her family, including her husband
Page [6]: After separatists threatened Isita Isaeva, aged 28, and her husband, they went to the police. But the police accused her husband of a series of murders and only allowed prison visits after he confessed to the crimes. He has now been in prison for 14 years
Find out more on thesochiproject.org. You can also follow The Sochi Project on Facebook and Twitter @thesochiproject. Support the project and receive the next annual publication about the North Caucasus