Destruction of Chechnya in the second war (1999-2000)Destruction in present Chechnya is really dramatic and is much worse than that of the 1994-1996 war. After the first war most of Chechens managed to settle back in their damaged homes. Now most - especially Grozny citizens - have lost their homes, which cannot be restored. „More than 300,000 people are internal emigrants - they have to live with their friends and relatives, sometimes many families in one house," said Shamil Beno, representative of Chechen Republic in the Russian Federation. Scale of destruction in first war The volume of destruction is yet to be estimated. Several federal commissions visited Chechnya this year, but no figures of houses destroyed are available so far. Chechnya had already been destroyed during the first war (1994-96). Several months of fighting left the capital Grozny in ruins where nothing seemed to work anymore. After the first war the Ministry of Construction of the Chechen Republic officially claimed that 20 % of buildings in the capital couldn’t be repaired or the damage was such that repair was not technically amenable. Further 40 % were also damaged although restoration was still possible. Certain areas managed to survive the war virtually untouched, notably the villas on the suburbs - Kalinin, Michurin, Aldy or Katayama districts. The mountain village of Zony on the road from Chechnya to Georgia was entirely wiped out during the first war. Many other villages were damaged, notably in the foothills and in the mountains, such as Serzhen Yurt, the gateway to the Vedeno gorge. The village of Samashki has become a legend having faced two attacks, each time being almost burnt down. However, almost all villages south of the Rostov - Baku route, which crosses the south part of Grozny and the whole country, were bombed. Reconstructions after the first war The bombed and otherwise damaged villages have recovered from the ordeal much faster than Grozny. The people of Chechen villages did not wait for state allowances and built their dwellings from own resources and with their own hands. The position of Grozny was much worse. Until 1998, most of the private-owned houses were repaired from own resources. State-owned houses and high resident buildings weren’t practically repaired due to lack of financial resources. Some of the most heavily damaged buildings were demolished together with the fire-stained walls of the presidential palace. Communications, sewage and water supply networks were only repaired to a certain extent, partly due to the fact that they were in poor state even before the war. Nobody even tried to assess the material damage in all Chechnya after 1996. There were many official figures and surveys, although none of these had been performed on regular and systematic basis. Some resources were allocated from the Russian federal budget for reconstruction of towns and villages but all too often these didn’t reach the destination. It remains unclear where did all these billions of rubles go. Russian bureaucrats, Chechen rebels and new Chechen administration headed by president Aslan Maskhadov are all to blame for the stealing of resources allocated for the war-destroyed Chechnya. The new leadership failed to control anything, especially money. The Russian federal government insists that 5 billion rubles were allocated for Chechen reconstruction, equally admitting that the money didn’t reach its destination. Disaster in Grozny The second Russian-Chechen conflict started by the Chechen rebel invasion into the neighbouring Dagestan in late summer of 1999 and finished the doom, which began during the first war. Central Grozny was reduced to ashes and even the most optimistic wouldn’t dare estimate whether it can be ever reconstructed. This time even two and three-floor residential suburban houses were not spared by the air and artillery bombing. Virtually no family house around Grozny city centre remained intact. The centre proper no longer looks like a war-film setting (as in the first war) but a mere giant dump of used construction material. Water supply, sewage, electricity and gas supply networks are completely destroyed, although the locals managed to improvise and repair the gas piping to their houses. The Baku - Novorossiysk oil pipeline is damaged in many sections, although between the two wars it was already used to transport oil from the Azerbaijan Caspian shelf and plans were made for annual volume of 30 million tons of oil transported through Chechnya, thus bringing substantial income to the country. The central water supply system is so damaged that experts would prefer to build a new city in the green field with new utility networks. Instead, many small wells appeared in Grozny. These were dug by the citizens and from their resources and will be useless when the first frosts come. Almost all roads were destroyed in the centre of Grozny. Some of these were repaired by the Chechens after the first war but heavy military vehicles destroyed them in such way that regular cars are almost unable to pass such obstacles. Destroyed villages Villages in strategic locations, such as Serzhen Yurt, were also a target for the Russian bombing in the very beginning of the war. This time, material damage suffered is heavier than during the last conflict, especially due to the fact that the Russians were more cautious and consistent, strictly adhering to military guidebooks. These days they attack with heavy long-range weapons, deploying air force and helicopters for longer periods during a single operation. Military intelligence is used more often and more extensively, paratroopers are deployed more often, this time directly among the rebels in the mountain terrain. All changes in the Russian tactics had lead to an even larger number of Chechen villages destroyed than during the first war. During long-range artillery bombing of a village, reportedly a rebel post, a part of the village or all of it had quickly turned into ruins. Such was the destiny of Komsomolskoye and Duba Yurt villages in the foothills. Scores of villages were damaged. The villages through which the rebels passed while retreating form Grozny, such as Katyr Yurt and Shami Yurt were bombed heavily. Only plans Total material damage caused by the war is but roughly estimated. None of the humanitarian organisations has started reconstruction works in Grozny or in the countryside. The Russian federal government has promised to finance works on some of the state-owned buildings, hospitals and schools. Reconstruction has already begun in Grozny medical points, but de facto nothing was allocated from the budget and people work for free. The fact different to the first war is that many people do not come back from the refugee camps in Ingushetia and repairs of family houses are only slow. So far, no one seems to be dealing with the still repairable block tower buildings. Grozny citizens limit their effort to covering the windows with plastic and digging a well in the open field. Rudolf Zargaryan, director of the State Institute of Cities Projecting with the Russian Construction Ministry, said that from 10 years to 15 years would be needed to restore the flattened Grozny. According to Interfax, a Russian news agency, 405.4 million rubles ($1 is 28 rubles) have been spent this year on the restoration of the Chechen economy and 283 million rubles have been spent on the sowing campaign. We need to feed people The program of the restoration of the Chechen economy, approved in the beginning of June, allocated 7.75 billion rubles for this purpose. „The funds are not making it to Chechnya," Beno said. „Since Akhmad Kadyrov has been appointed head of administration in Chechnya in mid-June, his administration is getting no money," Beno said. „Just because the new administration must get an official approval by a governmental decree - and it is still not signed because of the red tape."
Beno said Kadyrov is critical of the governmental program prepared with the participation of Nikolai Koshman, former presidential representative in Chechnya replaced by Kadyrov. „The program highlights spendings which are not in the least a first priority in Chechnya," Beno said. „Look, out of this 7.75 billion rubles almost 2 billion are going to be spent on the restoration of the railway infrastructure. We have only 100 kilometers of railways here and they are not vital at this point. We need to feed people, to provide them warmth and housing for the coming winter - and for this purposes the program offers almost peanuts," said Beno. He said that only 222 million rubles are allocated for about 200,000 refugees in Ingushetia who are often shown in Russian TV programs complaining that they are not getting any hot food or even bread in refugee camps they are residing in. „Those 219 million rubles to restore gas transportation is also too miserable to give gas to people, 35.8 million rubles is too small for fixing water pipes and sewage system and also not sufficient is 299 million rubles on medicine and 376 million on education which includes restoration of educational institutions and wages for their staff," said Beno.
No wages According to Interfax, restoration works are conducted at 232 schools, three higher educational institutions, and 40 hospitals. However it is not enough evidence of consistent work to restore infrastructure in Chechnya. From time to time media reports that some
buildings have being restored, but most of it is patching them up. „The problem is that people are not getting wages for more than half a year. They are hungry and desperate and become more and more desperate each day looking at their hungry children," Beno said. He pessimistically assessed one of the latest media reports that military constructors started to restore a railway bridge across the Aksai river, which links Chechnya to Dagestan. „While they will be restoring that bridge, 10 jobless Chechens will be working on a plot to blow it up," Beno said. „Not terrorists, just desperate people. Why? Because they want money to feed their hungry children and not a bridge to transport coffins with the corpses of
their children who will die of hunger," said Beno.
Yevgenia Borisova of The Moscow Times contributed to this report.
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