Russian soldiers check refugees in IngushetiaRuslan Isayev, North Caucasus – The solution of the question of Chechen refugees in Ingushetia ranks among the priorities of the new Ingush leadership, the newly elected President of Ingushetia Murat Zyazikov said several times. It is now certain that the course of Zyazikov’s presidency will completely differ from the one of previous president Ruslan Aushev, mainly in the fact that it will be more loyal to Moscow.
Units of the Russian army are coming to Ingushetia. Recently a motorized battalion of the 58th army arrived in the airport district between the villages of Troitskaya and Sleptsovskaya. Its soldiers appeared near local refugee camps in Sleptsovskaya, located at the post of the Ingush police on the road leading to camps, and began to stop cars and check the identity of thier passengers. Nobody has been reported detained.
The fact that Russian soldiers have appeared close to Ingush refugee camps confirms the worries of Chechen refugees about their forced return to Chechnya.
Previous Ingush president Ruslan Aushev rejected the presence of the Russian army in Ingushetia, claiming that would deteriorate the situation in the region, which itself lacks stability. Under his presidency there was only a frontier detachment of the Federal Frontier Service of the Russian Federation guarding the Ingush section of the Russian–Georgian border. Besides, Aushev denied forced return of Chechen refugees, which obviously satisfied neither Russian leaders nor Akhmad Kadyrov, head of the pro-Moscosw administration of Chechnya. |
