Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, who was killed in an altercation with police this morning, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, who tonight was taken into custody, are suspected of carrying out the bombings at the Boston Marathon on Monday. The brothers are reportedly of
Chechen descent, with roots to the Russian Republic of Dagestan and the former
Soviet Republics of either Kazakhstan or Kyrgyzstan.
The National Security Network (NSN), which was founded in
June 2006 to revitalize America’s national security policy, just provided me with me an informative primer on these nations as they may relate to events unfolding today in Boston and around the world. The NSN material includes background on these locales as well as links to
pertinent news stories.
Chechens have populated the mountainous
Northern Caucasus for hundreds of years, according to NSN, which notes that while
the subjects of Moscow's governance for two centuries, Chechnya has oscillated
between de facto autonomy and being ruled by Moscow. Dzhokhar and Tamerlan
Tsarnaev are reported
to have left Russia in 2002 to come to the United States.
Their uncle says that they never lived
in Chechnya itself; reports indicate that Tamerlan Tsarnaev spent six
unaccounted-for months in Russia in 2012. Ethnic Chechens are
dispersed throughout other parts of the former Soviet Union as well, discussed
below in NSN’s comprehensive recap:
--------------
From the National Security Network:
Chechen Terrorism (Russia, Chechnya, Separatist)
Preeti Bhattacharji, Council on Foreign Relations, 4/8/13
Preeti Bhattacharji, Council on Foreign Relations, 4/8/13
Timeline: Chechnya
BBC News, 1/19/2011
Chechnya. Kyrgyzstan. The Caucasus
Slate, 4/19/2013
9 Things You Need To Know About Chechnya
Dan Oshinsky, BuzzFeed 4/19/2013
Chechnya's conflict has been ongoing
throughout this generation
The fall of the Soviet Union led
Chechen separatists to launch a coordinated campaign for independence and a
continued Chechen insurgency, precipitating the First Chechen war
(1994-1996). Parts of the insurgency took on an Islamist cast. After
80,000 people had died, a peace deal was brokered in 1996 with an agreement on
economic relations and reparations to Chechens affected by the war.
In response to two attacks by Chechens
in Moscow, the Second Chechen War commenced in September 1999, Russian troops
maneuvered into Chechnya and suppressed resistance through massive artillery
fire.
The wars resulted in an exodus of
Chechens - most to re-start peaceful lives as refugees and some to extremist
groups. Chechens have been both perpetrators and victims of terror attacks
inside Russia, most memorably in sieges of a Moscow movie theater in 2002 and
an elementary school in Beslan, North Ossetia in 2004. In the last decade,
Chechens have been connected to militant groups in the Middle East and South
Asia, and faced charges in European countries. The Washington Post notes
that "in 2011, a Chechen-born man was sentenced in Denmark to 12 years in
prison for preparing a letter bomb that exploded as he was assembling it in a
Copenhagen hotel a year earlier. Lors Doukayev, a then 25-year-old,
one-legged resident of Belgium, was wounded when assembling the device, which
is believed also to have been intended for the Jyllands-Posten newspaper, which
published controversial cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad. Two suspects,
Elsy Issakov and Mourad Idrissov, were arrested in Paris and a third, Ali
Dokaev, was detained in the town of Noyon, northeast of the French
capital."
Analysis:
Putin's War in Chechnya: Who steers the course?
Pavel
K. Baev, International Peace Research Institute, Oslo; via CSIS, 11/2004
Key Players in the
Chechen Conflict New York Times via Agence
France-Presse, 2000
Reported Russian
Caucasus involvement in Boston bombings follow years of terror in Russia Washington Post 4/19/2013
International Crisis Group Controversial Among
Russian North Caucasus Experts Valery Dzutsev,
Jamestown Foundation, 11/14/12
Getting the Caucasus Emirate Right Gordon M. Hahn, CSIS, 8/2011
The Alleged Dagestan Connection
The New York Times reports
that the Tsarnaev family briefly lived in the capital of the Russian Republic
of Dagestan before immigrating to the United States in 2002.
Dagestan is Chechnya's neighbor, the
southernmost republic of the Russian Federation in the Northern Caucasus with a
population of approximately 3 million, comprised of 32 indigenous ethnic groups
and a small percentage of ethnic Russians. Dagestan has experienced ethnic
tensions and intermittent violence since the First Chechen War in (1994-1996). Violence,
however, has escalated considerably in the aftermath of the Second Chechen war
(1999-2000), after which, in 2002, the Islamic insurgency Jamaat Shariat was
formed with establishing Sharia Law among its goals and has since been a
primary belligerent in hostilities. Unlike some surrounding conflicts, violence
in Dagestan is not driven by nationalism or secessionism but by poverty, police
abuses and religious conflict. The religiously-motivated conflict in the
Dagestan is complex, primarily involving traditional SufiMuslims, a more
conservative populations of SalafiMuslims - which Jamaat Shariat purports to
represent - and secularists. In recent years, conflict has escalated
dramatically. For example, in 2010, Dagestan experienced 685 casualties related
to terrorism and insurgency - more than twice the number of casualties
experienced in Chechnya the same year.
Inside the Deadly Russian Region the Tsarnaev Brother Used to Called Home
Uri Friedman, Foreign Policy, 4/19/13
Dangerous Graft
Tom Parfit, Foreign Policy, 3/23/11
Russia's Dagestan: Conflict Causes
International Crisis Group, 6/3/08
The North Caucasus: Russia's Volatile Frontier
Andrew C. Kuchins, Mathew Malarkey and Sergei Markedonov, CSIS, 3/11
Inside the Deadly Russian Region the Tsarnaev Brother Used to Called Home
Uri Friedman, Foreign Policy, 4/19/13
Dangerous Graft
Tom Parfit, Foreign Policy, 3/23/11
Russia's Dagestan: Conflict Causes
International Crisis Group, 6/3/08
The North Caucasus: Russia's Volatile Frontier
Andrew C. Kuchins, Mathew Malarkey and Sergei Markedonov, CSIS, 3/11
The Alleged Kazakhstan/Kyrgyzstan
Connection
Conflicting reports identify the
Tsarnaev brothers as having either lived Kazakhstan or Kyrgyzstan or having
immigrated to the United States with Kyrgyzstan passports.
It would not be unusual for ethnic
Chechens - as is allegedly is the case of the Tsarnaev brothers - to have
originated or otherwise had ties to either of the former Soviet Republics of
Kazakhstan or Kyrgyzstan. In Soviet history, Chechens emigrated to both
Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, sometimes involuntarily, as was the case in 1944
after the 1940-44 Chechen Insurgency under Stalin. Kyrgyzstan has a population
of over 5 million and has a large majority of ethnic Kyrgyz and Muslims, with a
minority 20 percent practicing Russian Orthodox. Political instability has been
acute in Kyrgyzstan since popular unrest in 2005 following questionable
elections, after which largely peaceful opposition turned violent with the
assassination of multiple members of parliament. Kazakhstan is the
largest of the former Soviet Republics with a population of just under 20
million, a majority of whom are ethnic Kazakhs - though religious affiliations
are closely split between Russian orthodox and various sects of Islam.
Analysis:
Kazakhstan
Introduces New Counter-terrorism Strategy
Roger McDermott, the Jamestown Foundation, 4/9/13
Roger McDermott, the Jamestown Foundation, 4/9/13
Domestic
Stability to Remain Kazakhstan's main priority in 2013 Georgiy Voloshin, 1/16/13
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