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The recent government reshuffle in Chechnya carried out by rebel President Abdul-Khalim Sadulayev should be assessed calmly, Radio Liberty journalist Andrey Babitskiy believes. In an article published on The Chechen Times website, he said that Wahhabism or radical Islam was basically a means of motivation and a just means of defending a righteous cause, but deep down traditional Islam remains unshakable among all sections of Islamic society. Young men are gradually moving away from Wahhabism and returning to traditional Islam, he said. The following is the text of the report entitled "A. Babitskiy on the CRI president's decrees" published on The Chechen Times website on 11 February; subheadings have been inserted editorially:
Reaction to president's reshuffle
The analysis in the media and by experts of the appointment decisions made by the CRI [Chechen Republic of Ichkeria] president has been unusually in one and the same key. This topic is being discussed everywhere, with small variations: radical Islamists like [former rebel-backed Press and Information Minister] Movladi Udugov have once again succeeded in outmanoeuvring the European-oriented Chechen politicians. The result is that now, even outside Russia, those who support the radical versions of Islam are putting pressure on those who continue to espouse, relatively speaking, [former rebel- backed Chechen President Aslan] Maskhadov's line of peace and talks.
Eschatological predictions, [editor's note: eschatology - part of theology concerned with death and final destiny] offering a depressing choice between civilization and a theocratic nightmare, which are being made by political experts and journalists on the basis of such observations, are by no means new. It was simply that in the past they were the prerogative of the official Russian authorities who tried to convince their critics that there was no difference between [Chechen rebel warlord Shamil] Basayev and Maskhadov, except that they divided roles between them: the former operates openly as a terrorist and talks about his right to wage war by any means, whereas the latter, by continuing to appeal to the west, merely skilfully claimed adherence to the principles of democracy and international law.
But in the five and a half years the war has been going on the Kremlin has not been very successful in promoting its arguments or convincing its opponents that the Chechen...