Russia pins Dagestan attack on Ukraine and the West, ignoring religious tension

Trinity Sunday is likely one of the most vital holidays within the Orthodox calendar.

On this big day, 66-year-old Father Nikolai was in church within the metropolis of Derbent, Dagestan.

Situated in Russia’s North Caucasus area, Dagestan is a predominantly Muslim republic. However Derbent is named “the town of three religions”.

It’s one of many oldest Christian centres in Russia and residential to an historical Jewish group.

Each had been about to be attacked in probably the most brutal vogue.

On Sunday night gunmen stormed the church and murdered Father Nikolai. In addition they attacked the native synagogue, setting it on fireplace.

Across the similar time insurgents had been additionally on the rampage in Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan, focusing on a church and synagogue there, too.

Confronted with this dramatic coordinated assault, safety forces launched an “anti-terrorist operation”. In Dagestan, gun battles raged lengthy into the evening. At the least 5 of the attackers had been killed.

However why had they gone on a taking pictures spree?

The quick suspicion: hyperlinks to radical Islam. In any case, not way back, Dagestan was a hotbed of Islamic extremism that had spilled over from neighbouring Chechnya.

Once I visited Makhachkala again in 2010, almost day-after-day there have been studies of militants attacking police and native officers.

Throughout that journey, a policeman known as Magomed had instructed me:

“Each time I get out of the police automotive, I at all times marvel if the insurgents will see my uniform and shoot me. Six of my colleagues have been killed this yr. At evening you received’t discover any policemen on the streets. We’re all too frightened.”

The persistent financial and social issues of the area – excessive unemployment and rampant corruption – had been feeding extremism.

Radical concepts thrive in such a soil.

Lately Russian safety forces have gave the impression to be successful their battle in opposition to armed insurgents.

However Islamist assaults haven’t stopped. On a number of events the Islamic State group (IS) has claimed duty for assaults in Dagestan, together with a taking pictures outdoors a church within the metropolis of Kizlyar in 2018.

And but, when Russian MP Abdulkhakim Gadzhiev went on Russian state TV to touch upon Sunday’s bloodshed, he had a really completely different rationalization for what had occurred.

Mr Gadzhiev urged that the intelligence providers of Ukraine and Nato nations might have orchestrated the assaults. He offered no proof to again up his accusation.

And when the pro-Kremlin information website Komsomolskaya Pravda reported on occasions in Dagestan, it accused the “collective West” of making an attempt “to open a second entrance” in opposition to Russia.

The author continued: “In relation to unrest on this area historically it’s the ears of British intelligence that stick out.”

Blaming Ukraine – and the West. It jogs my memory of official Russian response to a mass taking pictures again in March. Greater than 140 folks had been killed after gunmen stormed the Crocus City Concert Hall close to Moscow.

The Russian authorities pointed the finger of blame at Kyiv and Western nations, regardless that IS had already claimed duty for the assault and launched video of it.

Days later President Vladimir Putin had even insisted: “Russia can’t be the goal of terrorist assaults by Islamic fundamentalists. We’re a rustic that demonstrates a singular instance of interfaith concord and inter-religious and inter-ethnic unity.”

Why do the Russian authorities seem reluctant to acknowledge and talk about the Islamist menace?

It has, I consider, to do with the battle in Ukraine.

Ever since Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbour, the Russian public has been led to consider that the best hazard they face, the largest menace to their nation, emanates from Ukraine and the West.

The authorities need Russians to view Kyiv and the “collective West” as public enemy primary.

If folks don’t, they could start to marvel why has Russia been pouring assets right into a battle with Ukraine as a substitute of specializing in countering Islamic extremism?

However not everybody right here believes that Ukraine has been plotting Islamist assaults on Russia.

In response to Abdulkhakim Gadzhiev’s TV feedback, a distinguished Russian Senator Dmitry Rogozin wrote on social media:

“If we blame each terrorist assault linked to nationwide and non secular intolerance…on scheming by Ukraine and Nato, this pink mist will lead us to greater issues.”

Mr Rogozin is well-known for his anti-Western rhetoric. However even he seems to know that Russia has little to achieve from robotically pointing the finger of blame at Kyiv and Western nations.