RAMZANISTAN Russia’s CheChen pRobleM

ThE SySTEMiC pRoBlEM WiTh ChEChNyA /34 Theses • The end of large-scale hostilities and the crushing of the armed underground resistance in Chechnya have, over the past few years, led to a stabilisation of the situation in the re- public, which – alongside the improvements in Russia’s eco- nomic situation during the first period of Vladimir Putin’s government – has become a symbol of the success of. [...] The identification of con- temporary Chechnya with Kadyrov derives from the fact that the situation in the republic has been determined for the last fifteen years by the informal pact concluded at the beginning of the second Chechen war (1999/2000) between the Kady- rovs (first Ahmad, then his son Ramzan) and Putin; the plan for governing Chechnya which remains valid to the present day; and the re. [...] stabilisation From the Kremlin’s point of view, the most important result of the Putin–Kadyrov pact and the last fifteen years of the Chechnya policy has been the stabilisation of the situation in the republic. [...] The Chechen language is gaining in importance, as it has moved from the private to the public sphere (in Soviet times and during the first years after the collapse of the USSR, the use of Russian predominated in public life; this is still the case in the neighbouring republics of the North Caucasus). [...] The use of the Chechen factor is possible in that capacity because of the bad reputation and negative con- notations which Chechens have in the eyes of the majority of the population of the former USSR.