Invisible Opposition: How Indigenous Peoples of the Russian Federation Fight for Their Independence
Have you ever heard about Free Idel-Ural civic movement? It’s no surprise if you haven’t. Western media talk and write a lot about the Russian opposition but often forget about the national minorities of the Russian Federation. This movement also opposes Putin’s regime because it destroys their people’s national identity and involves them in war with Ukraine. Let’s try to find out more about them.
Who They Are?
Idel-Ural means Volga-Urals in the Tatar language. This term often refers to the six republics of Russia — Bashkortostan, Chuvashia, Mari El, Mordovia, Tatarstan, and Udmurtia. In theory, they have autonomy and official languages but in practice, their status is hard to distinguish from that of ordinary Russian provinces (oblasts). The republics are completely dependent on the central government and suffer from forced Russification.
The story of Free Idel-Ural started in February 2018. One of the leaders of the Tatar national movement, Rafis Kashapov, and Syres’ Bolyaien’ who was a native of Mordovia and lead the Erzyan national movement conducted the press conference in Kyiv. With a small group of adherents, they publicly declared the establishment of Free Idel-Ural. Why in Kyiv? Kashapov protested against the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014 and spent three years in prison because of that. Syres’ Bolyaien’ has lived in Kyiv since Soviet times after military service. In the 1990s, he met Viacheslav Chornovil, a famous Ukrainian dissident and politician, while guarding the monument to Lenin. Chornovil was a political prisoner in Mordovia in the 1970s so he heard the familiar accent from Bolyaien’ almost immediately and stroke conversation. “Chornovil impressed me by the fact that he knew everything about my people, he knew more than me because he had been in the camps in our area” Syres’ recalled in an interview. He decided to guard his own culture instead of Soviet monuments. Later, Syres’ Bolyaien’ established the national society Ěrzäń val (“Erzyan word”) which united Erzyans and their descendants in the capital of Ukraine. Later, he was elected as the national leader of Erzya — inyazor.
During the first five months of its activity, Free Idel-Ural declared its struggle for the real sovereignty of the republics and avoided secessionist statements. But later the Russian Duma approved a law that allowed not to study the official languages of national republics in schools. It made the civic movement change the main aim of its activity. Free Idel-Ural declared that it wants to create independent national democratic states in Erzyano-Mokshania (Mordovia), Chuvashia, Mari El, Tatarstan, Udmurtia, and Bashkortostan. These republics will create an interstate association like European Union, called Idel-Ural.
Free Idel-Ural declares that it will achieve its aim through non-violent methods. The movement organizes protests against Putin’s regime across the world and informs international organizations about the Russification and persecution of civic activists of national movements in Russia. The first campaign was aimed against the law on languages mentioned above. Activists of Free Idel-Ural organized rallies in different countries informing the world about this discrimination of their peoples. Also, they protested against the persecution of national movement activists in Russia. On May 16, 2018, Free Idel-Ural picketed the Embassy of the Russian Federation in Ukraine. The participants of the action voiced two demands: to stop the persecution of activists of national movements and to release from prison the Tatar prisoner Danis Safargali, the founder of the Association of Indigenous Peoples of the Russian Federation, a well-known human rights activist who was sentenced to 3 years in prison. The reason for the arrest of the human rights activist was a fight during which Danis tried to protect his pregnant wife from the attackers.
Free Idel-Ural and Ukraine
The situation of national minorities in Russia is similar to what we, Ukrainians, experienced in the USSR. We also suffered from Russification and lost many intellectuals who opposed that policy (you can read more here). So it’s no surprise that activists of Free Idel-Ural found support from Ukrainian politicians. On December 7, 2018, the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine held a roundtable discussion on “Violation of the rights of indigenous peoples in the Russian Federation”, which brought together Ukrainian parliamentarians, diplomats, scholars, human rights activists and political emigrants from Russia. This discussion gave results several months later. On 30 May 2019, the Ukrainian parliament appealed to the United Nations, international parliamentary assemblies, and foreign national legislatures to condemn ongoing violations of the rights of indigenous non-Russian peoples in the Russian Federation.
On April 21, 2021, Syres’ Bolyaien’, as part of the Ukrainian delegation, spoke at the XX session of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. He told about the Russification of Erzyas. It was the first speech delivered in the Erzyan language at the UN. “Erzya can survive COVID-19 pandemic, but can’t survive in Russian Federation. Only international pressure on Moscow could protect us from the very last phase of ethnocide”, he said. Syres’ Boliayen’ also provided the Secretariat of the Forum with a statement about the violation of the rights of native peoples in the Russian Federation.
The full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine only made the problems of these national minorities more relevant. For them, it became that “very last phase of ethnocide” Boliayen talked about. Russia sent many of its indigenous people to wage war in Ukraine thus making them the accessories of its war crimes. So their organizations continued protests abroad. On July 23, 2023, they took part in Captive Nations Week in the USA by organizing rallies in many American cities — Chicago (Illinois), Seattle (Washington), Los Angeles, San Francisco, Irvine, and Sacramento (California). The largest rally was organized in New York City. The participants demanded the independence of their republics and expressed solidarity with Ukraine.
Why do I write about this? Just because of solidarity. Russian occupiers are committing the same crimes for ages. They tried to destroy our identity and still do that on occupied territories. They do the same with the indigenous people of the Russian Federation which in fact is a poorly disguised empire. I hope that the West will pay attention to these national movements. They definitely need support and deserve Oscar for their struggle but they don’t have such a strong lobby in the West as the Russian opposition.
