Introduction

Abstract

The collapse of the Soviet Union on 26 December 1991 brought a ‘wind of change’ for numerous peoples and nations, previously incorporated into the vast Soviet empire. The Caucasus, as well as the Baltic countries, Central Asia, Russia, Moldova and Ukraine, was entering a new stage of its history — the post-communist era. Yet, unlike other former Soviet regions, the Caucasus ¹ — a mountainous multiethnic region — dissolved into violent armed conflicts, fuelled by nationalist aspirations long suppressed under the Soviet rule. Territorial grievances harboured by Armenians and Azerbaijanis, similarly to Georgians and Abkhazians, infected the South Caucasus with ethnic violence. In the North Caucasus, Boris Yeltsin’s infamous suggestion, in his address to regional leaders, ‘to grab as much autonomy as you can hold’, was followed by the rise of Chechen nationalist separatism. The start of the Chechen wars marked the beginning of over 20 years of armed struggle in the North Caucasus.