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JIHADISM ON THE RISE IN AZERBAIJAN
By Emil Souleimanov (05/02/2012 issue of the CACI Analyst)
In early April, Azerbaijani authorities carried out a massive crackdown on
presumed Jihadi cells in the northern areas of Azerbaijan (Qakh, Zaqatala,
Sheki, and Qusar districts) along with Baku and the republic's two largest
cities after the capital city, Ganja and Sumgait. According to official
sources, Ministry for National Security troops detained up to 20 members of
the infamous Jihadist group `Forest Brothers.' The operation raises
questions about the growing appeal of Jihadist ideology in especially
Azerbaijan's north, as well as the forceful measures applied by the
authorities to tackle the problem.
*BACKGROUND: *During the operations, a large amount of illegally owned
weapons, ammunition, and literature propagating `Wahhabism,' terrorism, and
militant Jihad was discovered. In the course of the detainment of Vuqar
Padarov, a Zaqatala-born Salafi and one of the leaders of the unit, an
Azerbaijani officer lost his life in a shootout. Most importantly,
Azerbaijani authorities have asserted that members of a militant unit were
planning a number of terrorist and diversionary attacks in the republic
with the aim of `undermining the political stability in the country and
causing panic among the population.' Among other things, Jihadists were
said to prepare attacks on members of law enforcement units, Shiite shrines
and other objects associated with the state and with `heresy.'
This information might have surprised many outsiders. Until recently,
sandwiched between Dagestan in the North Caucasus with its ongoing Islamist
insurgency and the clerical regime in Iran in the south, Azerbaijan seemed
to have remained an island of secularism. Having experienced seven decades
of Soviet-imposed state atheism, Azerbaijani society has been considered
impervious to manifestations of political, let alone militant, Islam. The
roots of Azerbaijani secularism run even deeper to the period of the turn
of the 19th and 20th centuries, when Azerbaijani national identity was
shaped by local intellectuals whose modernist and anti-clerical sentiments
were remarkable for that time.
The increased interest in religion that established itself in the second
half of the 1980s in Azerbaijan - as elsewhere in the Soviet Union -
nevertheless barely overcame the realm of ethno-cultural identity as it
remained focused on symbolic aspects of social life. In the late Soviet and
early post-Soviet era, the vast majority of Azerbaijanis identified
themselves as Muslims. However, surveys disclosed that only a tiny share,
generally less than a quarter of those who considered themselves Muslims,
had an even basic understanding of the pillars of Islamic religion.
According to a survey conducted in 2000, less than 7 percent of the
respondents considered themselves `firm believers', while only 18 percent
claimed to observe salat (namaz), one of the pillars of Muslim faith. Owing
to the weak position of Islam in the public sphere in Soviet and
Post-Soviet Azerbaijan, even the confessional split played a minor role in
Azerbaijani society. Although no statistics exist, two thirds of
Azerbaijanis presumably belong to the Shiite branch of Islam, whereas the
remainder inhabiting primarily the northern and western areas of the
republic identify with Sunni Islam.
*IMPLICATIONS:* Yet, the situation has changed somewhat over the last
decade. First, due to the strengthening of the political regime in
Azerbaijan and widespread corruption, clientelism and nepotism as
indispensable features, and reduced space for the republic's political
opposition - traditionally a domain of secularist parties - an increasingly
high number of Azerbaijanis have turned to religion as a kind of protest
ideology. Second, what is often considered `spoiling' of societal morals (a
more frivolous behavior of women, alcoholism, drug addiction,
homosexuality, gambling, decreasing respect toward the elderly, etc.)
centered in Baku and other urban areas has outraged many conservative
Azerbaijanis primarily in the rural areas, who have found their path to
Islam as a source of counterbalance to the alleged decay of traditional
values.
With support from Iran and inhabitants of some rural areas, elements of
anti-regime Shiite clergy have emerged in Azerbaijan, which have not
shunned from clashing with the authorities over symbolic issues related to
religion. This has most notably involved the highly debated issue of
headscarves, which were banned in schools by Azerbaijani authorities in
2010. This was particularly obvious during the mass demonstrations held in
the village of Nardaran on the Absheron peninsula, a stronghold of radical
Shiites, and some other areas of the republic during headscarf-related
clashes with police.
A similar evolution has been underway with the country's Sunni Salafi
community, whose adherents have been considered relatively peaceful until
recently. First, Salafis in Azerbaijan primarily recruit from the country's
mountainous areas in the north which are predominantly inhabited by
Lezgins, Avars and Tsakurs. These are Dagestani ethnicities sharing the
Sunni religion with their fellow countrymen from across the
Russian-Azerbaijani border, even though the share of ethnic Azerbaijanis
among Salafis has also been on the rise. In fact, North Azerbaijani
ethnicities have been receptive to the impact of Salafi teaching that has
been flourishing in Dagestan since the 1990s and intensifying in recent
years as a result of the dramatically growing insurgency in that republic.
Moreover, dozens of Azerbaijani citizens of Sunni faith and predominantly
-
yet not exclusively - of Avar and Lezgin origin have reportedly
participated in the North Caucasus insurgency. A prominent example is the
case of Ilhar Mollachiyev, a Tsakhur from Northern Azerbaijan who until his
death in 2008 was the leader of `Shariat', the largest Dagestani Jihadist
jamaat.
Additionally, for many young Sunnis living in Azerbaijan, Salafism has been
seen as a fashionable ideology of protest. Becoming a member of a Salafi
jamaat in their eyes equals joining a global Jihadi movement waged in the
name of God and with the aim of overthrowing illegitimate regimes and
creating an Islamic state based on the principles of divine justice, piety,
and welfare. The general resentment of the republic's pro-regime Shiite
clergy, which is viewed as discredited and corrupt, has also contributed a
great deal. Importantly, in the agenda of some Azerbaijani Salafis,
particularly from the ranks of Lezgins and Avars, irredentist claims have
been on the rise as they view it as their task to join the country's
northern mountainous provinces with the Caucasus Emirate in general and
Dagestan in particular.
Anti-Azerbaijani sentiments have been growing in the republic's Lezgin and
Avar-populated areas as well, not least due to the growing crackdowns by
Azerbaijani authorities against alleged or real `Wahhabis' in local mosques
and villages. In anti-Salafi crackdowns, ethnicity often coincides with
religion, which deepens the gap between the highlanders and the idea of the
Azerbaijani nation. Importantly, local inhabitants have complained about
xenophobic overtones which, they allege, frequently accompany police
operations in the republic's north, most lately during the most recent
massive mop-ups in northern Azerbaijan in 2010.
Last but not least, Lezgin and Avar areas have historically belonged to the
most traditionalist communities in Azerbaijan with partially still
prevalent archaic patterns of social organization (tukhums or clans), the
principles of customary law (clan or family honor, blood feud) and Islamic
religion playing a bigger role in the mountainous north than elsewhere in
Azerbaijan. Following the scheme of mobilization familiar from the case of
the Dagestani insurgency, `Wahhabis' from among Lezgins, Avars, and North
Azerbaijani highlanders are generally more prone to avenge members of law
enforcement agencies for injuries and humiliation inflicted on them than in
the rest of Azerbaijan.
*CONCLUSIONS:* Lacking substantial support from external sources and
enjoying a very limited popular support from highly secularized or Shiite
Azerbaijanis, who generally distance themselves from what they call
`radical Islam,' Salafism or its militant form Jihadism, seems to be the
easiest task for Azerbaijani authorities to cope with. Yet the potential of
Jihadist ideology presents a potential danger to the security and
territorial integrity of the Azerbaijani state. This is due to the
intersection of religious and ethnic loyalties in the northern areas of
Azerbaijan with a strong demographical presence of Dagestani ethnic groups
with latent irredentist sentiments. Should the Azerbaijani authorities
continue to carry out fierce and indiscriminate `anti-Wahhabi' policies
fueled by nationalist sentiments in the republic's borderland areas with
Dagestan, Salafism might turn into an umbrella - a transnational ideology
of resistance among Avars, Lezgins, and Tsakhurs linking them even closer
to the Dagestani cause, and possibly ensuring support from Dagestan-based
insurgents. In this case, Baku might face another territorial conflict with
unpredictable consequences.
*AUTHOR'S BIO:* Dr. Emil Souleimanov is assistant professor at the
Department of Russian and East European Studies, Charles University in
Prague, Czech Republic. He is the author of `Understanding Ethnopolitical
Conflict: The Wars in Karabakh, Abkhazia, and South Ossetia Reconsidered'
(Oxford: Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming in 2013) and `An Endless War: The
Russian-Chechen Conflict in Perspective' (Peter Lang, 2007).
http://www.cacianalyst.org/newsite/?q=node/5766
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
By Emil Souleimanov (05/02/2012 issue of the CACI Analyst)
In early April, Azerbaijani authorities carried out a massive crackdown on
presumed Jihadi cells in the northern areas of Azerbaijan (Qakh, Zaqatala,
Sheki, and Qusar districts) along with Baku and the republic's two largest
cities after the capital city, Ganja and Sumgait. According to official
sources, Ministry for National Security troops detained up to 20 members of
the infamous Jihadist group `Forest Brothers.' The operation raises
questions about the growing appeal of Jihadist ideology in especially
Azerbaijan's north, as well as the forceful measures applied by the
authorities to tackle the problem.
*BACKGROUND: *During the operations, a large amount of illegally owned
weapons, ammunition, and literature propagating `Wahhabism,' terrorism, and
militant Jihad was discovered. In the course of the detainment of Vuqar
Padarov, a Zaqatala-born Salafi and one of the leaders of the unit, an
Azerbaijani officer lost his life in a shootout. Most importantly,
Azerbaijani authorities have asserted that members of a militant unit were
planning a number of terrorist and diversionary attacks in the republic
with the aim of `undermining the political stability in the country and
causing panic among the population.' Among other things, Jihadists were
said to prepare attacks on members of law enforcement units, Shiite shrines
and other objects associated with the state and with `heresy.'
This information might have surprised many outsiders. Until recently,
sandwiched between Dagestan in the North Caucasus with its ongoing Islamist
insurgency and the clerical regime in Iran in the south, Azerbaijan seemed
to have remained an island of secularism. Having experienced seven decades
of Soviet-imposed state atheism, Azerbaijani society has been considered
impervious to manifestations of political, let alone militant, Islam. The
roots of Azerbaijani secularism run even deeper to the period of the turn
of the 19th and 20th centuries, when Azerbaijani national identity was
shaped by local intellectuals whose modernist and anti-clerical sentiments
were remarkable for that time.
The increased interest in religion that established itself in the second
half of the 1980s in Azerbaijan - as elsewhere in the Soviet Union -
nevertheless barely overcame the realm of ethno-cultural identity as it
remained focused on symbolic aspects of social life. In the late Soviet and
early post-Soviet era, the vast majority of Azerbaijanis identified
themselves as Muslims. However, surveys disclosed that only a tiny share,
generally less than a quarter of those who considered themselves Muslims,
had an even basic understanding of the pillars of Islamic religion.
According to a survey conducted in 2000, less than 7 percent of the
respondents considered themselves `firm believers', while only 18 percent
claimed to observe salat (namaz), one of the pillars of Muslim faith. Owing
to the weak position of Islam in the public sphere in Soviet and
Post-Soviet Azerbaijan, even the confessional split played a minor role in
Azerbaijani society. Although no statistics exist, two thirds of
Azerbaijanis presumably belong to the Shiite branch of Islam, whereas the
remainder inhabiting primarily the northern and western areas of the
republic identify with Sunni Islam.
*IMPLICATIONS:* Yet, the situation has changed somewhat over the last
decade. First, due to the strengthening of the political regime in
Azerbaijan and widespread corruption, clientelism and nepotism as
indispensable features, and reduced space for the republic's political
opposition - traditionally a domain of secularist parties - an increasingly
high number of Azerbaijanis have turned to religion as a kind of protest
ideology. Second, what is often considered `spoiling' of societal morals (a
more frivolous behavior of women, alcoholism, drug addiction,
homosexuality, gambling, decreasing respect toward the elderly, etc.)
centered in Baku and other urban areas has outraged many conservative
Azerbaijanis primarily in the rural areas, who have found their path to
Islam as a source of counterbalance to the alleged decay of traditional
values.
With support from Iran and inhabitants of some rural areas, elements of
anti-regime Shiite clergy have emerged in Azerbaijan, which have not
shunned from clashing with the authorities over symbolic issues related to
religion. This has most notably involved the highly debated issue of
headscarves, which were banned in schools by Azerbaijani authorities in
2010. This was particularly obvious during the mass demonstrations held in
the village of Nardaran on the Absheron peninsula, a stronghold of radical
Shiites, and some other areas of the republic during headscarf-related
clashes with police.
A similar evolution has been underway with the country's Sunni Salafi
community, whose adherents have been considered relatively peaceful until
recently. First, Salafis in Azerbaijan primarily recruit from the country's
mountainous areas in the north which are predominantly inhabited by
Lezgins, Avars and Tsakurs. These are Dagestani ethnicities sharing the
Sunni religion with their fellow countrymen from across the
Russian-Azerbaijani border, even though the share of ethnic Azerbaijanis
among Salafis has also been on the rise. In fact, North Azerbaijani
ethnicities have been receptive to the impact of Salafi teaching that has
been flourishing in Dagestan since the 1990s and intensifying in recent
years as a result of the dramatically growing insurgency in that republic.
Moreover, dozens of Azerbaijani citizens of Sunni faith and predominantly
-
yet not exclusively - of Avar and Lezgin origin have reportedly
participated in the North Caucasus insurgency. A prominent example is the
case of Ilhar Mollachiyev, a Tsakhur from Northern Azerbaijan who until his
death in 2008 was the leader of `Shariat', the largest Dagestani Jihadist
jamaat.
Additionally, for many young Sunnis living in Azerbaijan, Salafism has been
seen as a fashionable ideology of protest. Becoming a member of a Salafi
jamaat in their eyes equals joining a global Jihadi movement waged in the
name of God and with the aim of overthrowing illegitimate regimes and
creating an Islamic state based on the principles of divine justice, piety,
and welfare. The general resentment of the republic's pro-regime Shiite
clergy, which is viewed as discredited and corrupt, has also contributed a
great deal. Importantly, in the agenda of some Azerbaijani Salafis,
particularly from the ranks of Lezgins and Avars, irredentist claims have
been on the rise as they view it as their task to join the country's
northern mountainous provinces with the Caucasus Emirate in general and
Dagestan in particular.
Anti-Azerbaijani sentiments have been growing in the republic's Lezgin and
Avar-populated areas as well, not least due to the growing crackdowns by
Azerbaijani authorities against alleged or real `Wahhabis' in local mosques
and villages. In anti-Salafi crackdowns, ethnicity often coincides with
religion, which deepens the gap between the highlanders and the idea of the
Azerbaijani nation. Importantly, local inhabitants have complained about
xenophobic overtones which, they allege, frequently accompany police
operations in the republic's north, most lately during the most recent
massive mop-ups in northern Azerbaijan in 2010.
Last but not least, Lezgin and Avar areas have historically belonged to the
most traditionalist communities in Azerbaijan with partially still
prevalent archaic patterns of social organization (tukhums or clans), the
principles of customary law (clan or family honor, blood feud) and Islamic
religion playing a bigger role in the mountainous north than elsewhere in
Azerbaijan. Following the scheme of mobilization familiar from the case of
the Dagestani insurgency, `Wahhabis' from among Lezgins, Avars, and North
Azerbaijani highlanders are generally more prone to avenge members of law
enforcement agencies for injuries and humiliation inflicted on them than in
the rest of Azerbaijan.
*CONCLUSIONS:* Lacking substantial support from external sources and
enjoying a very limited popular support from highly secularized or Shiite
Azerbaijanis, who generally distance themselves from what they call
`radical Islam,' Salafism or its militant form Jihadism, seems to be the
easiest task for Azerbaijani authorities to cope with. Yet the potential of
Jihadist ideology presents a potential danger to the security and
territorial integrity of the Azerbaijani state. This is due to the
intersection of religious and ethnic loyalties in the northern areas of
Azerbaijan with a strong demographical presence of Dagestani ethnic groups
with latent irredentist sentiments. Should the Azerbaijani authorities
continue to carry out fierce and indiscriminate `anti-Wahhabi' policies
fueled by nationalist sentiments in the republic's borderland areas with
Dagestan, Salafism might turn into an umbrella - a transnational ideology
of resistance among Avars, Lezgins, and Tsakhurs linking them even closer
to the Dagestani cause, and possibly ensuring support from Dagestan-based
insurgents. In this case, Baku might face another territorial conflict with
unpredictable consequences.
*AUTHOR'S BIO:* Dr. Emil Souleimanov is assistant professor at the
Department of Russian and East European Studies, Charles University in
Prague, Czech Republic. He is the author of `Understanding Ethnopolitical
Conflict: The Wars in Karabakh, Abkhazia, and South Ossetia Reconsidered'
(Oxford: Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming in 2013) and `An Endless War: The
Russian-Chechen Conflict in Perspective' (Peter Lang, 2007).
http://www.cacianalyst.org/newsite/?q=node/5766
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress