CHECHNYA LINKS LIBRARY

Authorities plan to dismantle tent camps in Ingushetia by October

Timur Aliyev, North Caucasus - Tent camps of Chechen refugees in Ingushetia will be dismantled by October, according to Akhmed Zaurbekov of the Chechen committee for compensation and affairs of forcibly displaced persons, which was set up by the Moscow-backed government of the Chechen Republic.

The camps will be liquidated because they do not provide conditions for „normal life“ and do not comply with epidemiological standards. „The tents have become unfit for living, especially in the Bella camp,“ said Zaurbekov.

Refugees from the dismantled camps will be placed either into ‘temporary settlements‘ in Ingushetia or in temporary accommodation centers in Chechnya, Zaurbekov added.

At the moment, the refugees´ return is hindered by a lack of available housing. „However, two new locations are being prepared in Chechnya - one in the ‘Ippodromny‘ neighborhood of Grozny and the other in the Sernovodskoye village,“ Zaurbekov elaborated.

According to the Chechen Refugee Committee, some 10,000 people applied for return to Chechnya.

Human rights organizations dealing with refugee issues regard the planned liquidation of the camps as a part of Akhmad Kadyrov´s election campaign strategy. During his July 4 meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Kadyrov promised that „by September not a single tent will remain on the Ingush territory.“

„Every time substantial changes occur in the political life of the country, the [Moscow-backed] leadership of Chechnya desperately attempts to dismantle the tent villages in Ingushetia,“ says Ruslan Zhadayev of the Chechen Committee for National Salvation.

„The tent villages are incontrovertible evidence that, in spite of the assurances of the authorities that the republic is returning to a peaceful life, the real situation in Chechnya is far from stable,“ Zhadayev said.

According to the territorial department of the Russian federal migration service, there are 62,700 Chechen refugees remaining in Ingushetia, 13,000 of whom live in tent camps, 22,700 in ‘temporary settlements‘ and 25,700 in private accommodation.

(B/V,T)