By Lauryn Mayer
Imagine that you hear of a catastrophic fire in your neighborhood. You gather together some spare clothes and canned food, and hurry down the street to lend a hand. As you approach the charred buildings, you are stopped by both the landlord and a representative for tenants' rights, each of whom insists that you fill out a 50-page form in triplicate. You are barred from the neighborhood until it is reviewed and approved. When it is, you realize that you are only permitted into a parking lot 10 miles away, and can only donate two mismatched socks and a bottle of water.
This imaginary scenario merely hints at the problems facing one particular group of frustrated humanitarians: those who packed up and went to help heal war-torn Chechnya, only to find that good will and hard work were but half the battle. Their situation, and the desperate conditions of the civilian population, have spurred a number of international institutions to donate their time and talents in the search for a solution.
The Humanitarianism and War Project, a brainchild of Brown's Thomas J. Watson Jr. Institute for International Studies, sponsored a research team to investigate what they cited as the unique obstacles to humanitarian action present in the Chechen/Russian conflict zone.
Greg Hansen, a Canadian expert in conflict studies, and Robert Seeley, a British national associated with the Watson Institute, left in April for a three-week tour of the embattled region, returning with interviews and information that reveal both the vulnerability of the regional population and the challenges faced by the agencies who attempt to relieve it.
For the people caught between Russian and Chechan fire, the picture is bleak. Since the conflict began in 1991, over 100,000 people have been forced to relocate, a flux that has placed a severe burden on the already strained resources of the neighboring areas. For Ingushetia, one of the major relocation sites, it spells a breakdown of even basic services. The area is taxed to the limit, Hansen says bluntly. Utilities, health services, and schools are struggling to accommodate the flood of people. Moreover, he adds, even these so-called safe spaces are subject to harassment by Russian forces: "One of the most striking episodes from my tour was when we visited a camp located between Chechnya and Ingushetia. This place was supposed to be out of the conflict zone, but was threatened by a Russian military commander, who said he would return to drag the people out if they did not leave. There's an appalling lack of security for the civilians here. Increased Russian attacks on civilian targets have blurred the lines between battlefield and refuge; when asked about the boundaries between Chechnya and the surrounding towns, a refugee replied shortly, `If it's being bombed, it's Chechnya.'"
These indiscriminate attacks put the humanitarian agencies directly in the line of fire. Since the onset of the war, at least three expatriate humanitarian workers have been killed, in addition to an unknown number of local relief agents. Most of the agencies have relocated their centers of operation to areas further from Chechnya, and many are now operating on a greatly reduced staff, a situation that exacerbates the difficulty in providing for the displaced and threatened people.
In addition to the physical dangers and the drain on their numbers, the humanitarian agencies face a minefield of bureaucratic, cultural, and ideological obstacles. Access to the places of greatest need is difficult to obtain: Routinely, humanitarian agents are prevented from passing through Russian checkpoints, or are forced to wait weeks for often inadequate access passes. This blockade stems in part from Russia's desire to keep the region out of the international view, Hansen notes: If you have a lot of humanitarian agencies running around an area like Chechnya, you're going to have a lot of gut-wrenching reports in circulation. The Chechen rebel government has proved equally unsympathetic, blocking workers from its own secured areas.
Surprisingly, a good deal of resistance to humanitarian efforts comes from the displaced people themselves. "We're dealing with a people who have no concept of a human services agency that is not directly connected with the government," Hansen explains. "So when the agencies go around to these people and try to get the information they need to begin work, they're confronting a great deal of natural suspicion: Why is this person asking me where my family is? Who are they reporting to? One of the most poignant moments of my trip came when we were following a small group to a hospital that needed some work. During the time that we were there, the place was shelled. As we were leaving, the people living there asked that we not come back. In their eyes, our presence was directly connected with the bombing."
In Hansen's view, military and civilian resistance to the humanitarian effort springs from misapprehensions about its nature. We're in new territory here. The agencies are used to going into places in which their aims and mission are known. Here, they're faced with a government which is used to deploying unlimited force, and a civilian population that is only beginning to grapple with the concept of a civil society of international humanitarians. It's a very different set of problems.
These problems become even more complex on the international scale. Part of the responsibility, according to Hansen, must be laid at our own door. The West has been suffering from an overly dualistic mentality: It sees its options as either ignoring the war in order to concentrate on the long-term challenges facing post-Soviet areas, or condemning the war to the detriment of its larger agenda. We need to think of a way to address both needs. A case in point, he adds, is the United Nation's relatively weak stand on the Russian/Chechen conflict. Russia's position on the U.N. Security Council has resulted in a conflict between humanitarian and political agendas within the U.N. itself. "While I don't discount the sensitivity of the issue," says Hansen, "the U.N. has a humanitarian mandate; if it does not follow this mandate because of political pressure, its integrity and effectiveness as an institution will be compromised in the future."
Fraught with both internal and international tension, can the political and humanitarian agendas surrounding the Chechen region be brought together in a peaceful and productive union? Thinking in long-term parameters, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has begun an early education program in Russia to teach a new generation about the need for humanitarian rules of war. With time, the continued work and visibility of the agencies should eventually lead to better recognition of their mission among both military and civilian populations. At present, however, there seems little promise of a respite from regional violence, or an assured refuge for its victims. Hansen grimly summarizes the cost of delay: The longer the West acquiesces to this war, the more bodies pile up, the longer people's memories become, and the less hope there is for a reconciliation.