Representatives of the Chechen public are proposing that Defender of the Fatherland Day on February 23 be abolished and celebrated on some other date instead. Participants in a roundtable discussion in Grozny made this request to the Russian leadership. The nationwide holiday on February 23 coincides with one of the most tragic dates in the history of the Chechen and Ingush peoples. On this day in 1944, by Stalin’s order, the deportation of Chechens and Ingush began. As a result, according to various estimates, the populations of these peoples declined by a third. Tens of thousands died while being transported in freight cars, for days without food or water. For many years, February 23 has been observed in Chechnya as a Day of National Mourning. In this connection, participants in the roundtable in Grozny appealed to the Russian leadership with a request to abolish Defender of the Fatherland Day and move it to any other date, Interfax reports. They also proposed declaring January 9 the Day of the Restoration of the National Statehood of the Chechen People. On that day in 1957, the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Republic was restored, and a year earlier, by decree of Nikita Khrushchev, Chechens and Ingush were officially rehabilitated. In the Chechen capital, a monument to Khrushchev will soon appear, and one of Grozny’s squares may possibly be named in his honor. Representatives of the scientific and creative intelligentsia, ministries, agencies, and the Chechen parliament took part in the roundtable. The meeting was chaired by Dukvakha Abdurakhmanov, speaker of the lower house of the Chechen Republic’s parliament. http://www.echo.msk.ru/news/353804.html Frankly, I’m already tired of these so-called representatives of the public. First they demand all the oil revenues, then they want increased federal transfers, then they object to certain films. Look at the Tatars. They have far more grounds for all sorts of grievances. But they behave decently. I wonder, if not all Chechens but only selected “representatives of the public” were deported to Kazakhstan, would that be considered genocide?
People