298
organized in Grozny on 3-4 October 1992, this split came to light. The
representatives took two different approaches on Russia. The first group, which
consisted mainly of Chechens, the only policy towards Russia should be a
hardening of attitude and possible secession. The other group consisted mainly of
Circassian peoples and most of the Abkhaz, defended more compromising and
moderate policies. They preferred to stay in the jurisdiction of more powerful state,
i.e. Russia.
Meanwhile, increasing compromise between Russia and Georgia (i.e. the
main rival of the Confederation at that time), and the intensifying clashes between
the peoples of the North Caucasus affected the Confederation adversely. The
Confederation failed to help these inter-Mountaineer claims and clashes.
Meanwhile, the Russians, because of the Chechen supremacy in the
Confederation, after the submission of Georgian leaders to Russian will and the
Georgian participation to Commonwealth of Independence States, decided to
establish their own umbrella organizations in the North Caucasus. These
organizations, established by existing official administrations of the North
Caucasian autonomous regions’ leaders under the control of Russia made the
Confederation a marginalised body and diminished its authority and power. The
reconciliatory attitudes of other members of the Confederation, mainly the Abkhaz
and Circassian, resulted in the emergence of rival factions, directed by the
Chechens, within the Confederation. This group also established its own
organization, the Caucasian Home, ultimately aimed at the formation of a broader
Confederation together with Azerbaijan and if possible Georgia.
299
In this perplexing situation the founding leaders of the Confederation lost
their bases in the Confederation and the life of the North Caucasian peoples. Apart
from this, the beginning of the Russian-Chechen War, and the apathy of other
Mountaineer peoples to the Chechen cause at last brought the collapse of the
Confederation. The Confederation, because of the lack of massive support of
Chechens, the Abkhaz and in relation with them, the Circassians, turned a marginal
ghost organization.
The Confederation of Mountain Peoples of the Caucasus was just an
episode of the North Caucasian struggle for unification and liberation. Although its
tragic end, it added one more volume to the Mountaineers’ experience of struggle.
Today, the establishment of a North Caucasian union would be accepted as a
utopian. In the view of political, territorial, and religious differences between the
Mountaineers and more important than the existence of Russian and Georgian
supremacy would make the regional integration a speculation, but, the process is
going on and there is an undeniable fact that among the North Caucasians there
was, is and will be a belief that the Mountaineer peoples have the common identity
and myth of North Caucasian unity which would be turned into a reality under the
suitable conditions.
300
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