RUSSIA Independence movements grow in Kalmykia

Those who support independence consider that it is an indispensable condition to preserve their own language and culture. The separatists oppose the “absurd centralization and militarization” of Russia. Separatist sentiments are also widespread among Baskars, Erzians, Buryats and Chechens.

Moscow () – The activists of the Congress of the Oirats and Calmuks, the Mongolian peoples heirs to the ancient Dzungars and Čuulgani, settled in the Lower Volga region, have approved and disseminated a document in which they support the cause of their own and full independence, as an indispensable condition for preserving the Kalmyk language and culture. The Congress was constituted in 2015 in the capital, Elistá, and in 2021 several of its members were arrested and imprisoned, but some managed to escape abroad.

The “Declaration of Independence of the Republic of Kalmykia” has been signed by several exponents both abroad and in Russia, among them the former director of the Center for the Development of the Kalmyk Language, Arslang Sandžiev, the leader of the local branch of the Liberal Party “Yabloko” Batyr Boromangaev, and other well-known political figures in the region such as Vladimir Dovdanov, Erentsen Doljaev and Albert Šarapov.

The text is a complement to another declaration, approved by the Supreme Soviet of Kalmykia during the Soviet era, in 1990, before the end of the regime. At that time, the people’s deputies voted in favor of the legal and democratic sovereignty of the Calmuco State, based on the right of peoples to self-determination. Current exponents of European Mongol ethnic politics believe that the principles of that first document never materialized in the autonomous republic after its incorporation into the Russian Federation and the long rule of the first president Kirsan Ilyumžinov. And much less, after the election of Vladimir Putin as president of Russia and the current administration of Batu Časikov, loyal to him.

The statement lists the main demands that will be raised to the Moscow regime. In the first place, to be able to emancipate oneself from the “absurd centralization and militarization of the country” and from the “total interference of the Kremlin in the cultural and linguistic life of the peoples conquered by Russia.” The Kalmyk separatists denounce “violations of international law” and five other points directed against the authoritarian and imperialist character of Russian policy.

According to the authors of the text, in the Russian Federation the rights of citizens are ignored, and they are subjected to constant repression. The current situation evokes the deportations of the Kalmyks in Stalin’s time and later, the issue of “illegally expropriated land”. Kalmykia, like other regions and nations that were once part of the Soviet Union, also has territorial claims against its neighbors. More specifically, against the border region of Astrakhan, which dates back to the Stalinist partitions of 1943. Doljaev, one of the authors, has argued for years that the entire Astrakhan area should be part of independent Kalmykia, since it is the territory history of the migration of the Kalmucks from Central Asia.

The Oiratos and Calmucos demand “liberation from colonial dependence”, and announce that they are ready to separate from the Russian republic, proclaiming their own sovereignty. As a background, there is a resurgence of many ethnic separatisms. Independence is “the necessary condition for the survival of the Kalmyk people,” says the document, which calls on all States and regional and world governments to support liberation, under the slogan “may justice triumph for all peoples!

The separatists also refer to the “League of Free Nations” – which met last June in an international meeting organized through the web – and the “Free Peoples Forum” organized by Tatar figures and others in Warsaw and Prague. in May and June. These events were also attended by Bashkir, Erzian, Kazakh, Buryat, Chechen and other nationalities living in the territories of the Russian Federation.