The government attempts to keep the delicate inter-ethnic and inter-confessional balance
One of the first documents signed by Ramazan Kadyrov after taking office, was the State Politics Conception stipulating the necessity of economic and cultural development for all ethnic groups within the Republic of Chechnya: Chechen, Russian, Ingush, Kumyk, Nogai, Armenian, Jewish and Cossack peoples have been living there side by side for centuries.
Nowadays the Chechen Republic is a home to representatives of 5 major ethnic groups (aprert from the Chechens themselves): Kumyks, Nogais, Avars, Meskhetian Turks and Tatars. They all have their own cultural centers and national cultural autonomies. Cossacks are more mixed up with their Chechen neighbors.
Over 30 ethnic groups have their homes in the Shelkovsky District. The village of Sary-Su is a place of compact dwelling for the Nagai people. It was established after the Revolution. More than 4,000 Nogais who live there guard their own traditions, consider Chechnya as their fatherland.
Tatars (there are more than 2,000 of them in the Republic) are also given an opportunity to perform their own traditions in religion and education. Russian people in Chechnya have always successfully performed the duties of teachers in schools and universities. Some 4,000 Avars and 5,000 Kumyks have their compact dwellings in Chechen Republic. Their children have to know three languages - Chechen, Russian and their national one.
More than a thousand Meskhetian Turks live in the Chechen Republic. Russia is the only country where the Meskhetian community is officially registered (since 1989) and has a diaspora (since 2004). All these different ethnic groups living in Chechnya have many common traditions, and mixed marriages are not rare at all.
The Republic's Ministry of External Relations, Ethnic Policy, Publishing and Information organizes National Culture Days for each ethnic group to encourage inter-ethnic friendship and cultural exchange. The Chechen authorities also work on maintaining peaceful relations between two major confessions: Orthodox Christianity and Islam. Meetings of religious leaders of both sides became a good tradition. A fundamental reconstruction of Republic's Orthodox churches and cemeteries has been undertaken, and even in the Chechen capital, Grozny, the orthodox cathedral saw a full reconstruction prior to the A. Kadyrov mosque construction. Additional funds are being allocated for the needs of Christian communities.
Timur Utsaev, Grozny. Exclusively for VK.
