Dusk over the empire

Repressive injustice in Putin’s Russia has led to a rebirth of regional opposition movements

Intense crackdowns on the Russian opposition began shortly after the war in Ukraine started, as the government enacted aggressive new laws meting out harsh punishments for anyone challenging its monopoly on power.

While these measures undoubtedly weakened Russia’s mainstream political opposition and saw nearly all its leaders either forced into exile, imprisoned, or worse, they have also heralded the emergence of new movements seeking greater autonomy and even independence for the regions that make up the vast Russian Federation.

Though these groups remain on the fringes of mainstream politics in most cases, the upsurge of regionalist and separatist ideas in Russia in the past few years is undeniable. As the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian empire, Yugoslavia and the USSR all demonstrate, the fall of empire is often accompanied by renewed interest in self-determination on the part of its constituent nations, and history shows us that they often do end up gaining or regaining independence.

There are a number of factors complicating any attempt by regions or national republics to break away from Russia, not least the centuries of Russification policies that have left many ethnic groups with limited connection to their own cultures and ethnic identities, as well as historically entrenched and widespread chauvinism towards ethnic minorities in Russia, which has led many people of non-Russian descent to identify as Russian to avoid discrimination.

Daniil Martikainen-Iarlykovskii spoke with activists from four different ethnic minorities in Russia, all of whom are facing their own specific challenges as they advocate for greater autonomy and even independence from Russia’s post-Soviet empire. Though still marginal, support for their movements has clearly been bolstered by the war in Ukraine and the serial injustice doled out by the regime.

Karelia: Wake-up call

In Karelia, a republic in northwestern Russia that borders Finland, members of the Karelian National Movement, a group advocating for the region’s independence, say they believe that the population is abandoning its once apolitical stance and waking up to the reality of Kremlin propaganda.

Though today over 86% of Karelia’s population identifies as ethnic Russian, the region has historically been home to multiple Finno-Ugric ethnicities, principally Finns and Karelians, which led the region to attempt to break away from Russia to join Finland following the overthrow of the Romanovs in 1917. Not only did this secession fail, in the 1940s the Soviet Union annexed 9% of Finland’s territory following the Winter War in 1939–40.

Minority languages are typically granted official language status in Russia’s national republics, but that’s almost never been the case in Karelia.

Mikhail Vento, an activist who is also a part of the 5,000-strong Veps people, another Finno-Ugric ethnic group native to Karelia, is a supporter of the movement and says that popular disillusionment with what he calls the “pitiful” current state of affairs in the republic is on the rise. The Veps have experienced ups and downs since the end of communist rule, initially enjoying a national autonomous region of their own within Karelia, only to have it abolished in 2005 as Moscow sought to reverse the seepage of political power to Russia’s regions.

Today, one of the main causes of dissent in Karelia — and beyond — is Moscow’s mobilisation policy, which has led to a disproportionate number of non-ethnic Russians being called up to fight in Ukraine. “They are taking too many people away. There are ways to evade conscription in big cities, but in backwaters like ours they just grab men and send them to the frontlines,” Vento says.

Karelia’s rising cost of living and the decreasing number of jobs available have led many to leave the region, further fuelling its rapid depopulation. Across the border, the success of Karelia’s western neighbour Finland only amplifies the frustration felt by locals. “We have similar weather, a similar environment and similar resources, but when you compare our quality of life, the difference is like night and day. Why can people there live a good life, while in our country they can only eke out an existence?” Vento laments.

Since the war in Ukraine began, both political repression and efforts at Russification have been on the rise in the region. In an attempt to erase Karelia’s historical ties to Finland, Moscow has taken aim at the region’s historical memory, effectively waging a war against the dead, destroying Finnish graveyards and war memorials and attacking anyone working to preserve such links to the past. The best example of this is the case of historian and the former head of Memorial in Karelia, Yury Dmitriev, whose discovery of mass graves used for the victims of Stalin’s Great Terror led to his imprisonment on trumped up charges.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the official status granted to Finnish in view of the region’s large Finnish-speaking minority was rescinded. Even though little is subsequently done to preserve them, minority languages are typically granted official language status in Russia’s national republics, but that’s almost never been the case in Karelia, where the regional government — both in the USSR and in modern Russia — has refused to recognise Karelian in an official capacity at all, bar a brief period in the 1930s before the Russo-Finnish war.

“More and more people are realising that if we don’t start fighting for our existence now, we may simply disappear as a people.”

This has led to schools in the region that teach children in minority languages getting shut down, further contributing to the erasure of minority identities. This, combined with a policy of draining the land of its natural resources and sending the money to Moscow, further damages the region’s unique heritage.

Supporters of Karelian independence believe that while the vast majority of the population identifies as ethnically Russian, this is more down to relentless Russification policies than the genuine replacement of the indigenous population. Activists remain hopeful that increased political consciousness will lead to a growing number of people identifying as ethnic Karelians once again.

“More and more people are realising that if we don’t start fighting for our existence now, we may simply disappear as a people,” Vento says.

Both the Karelian National Movement and the Nord group, an organisation of Karelian volunteers fighting alongside the Armed Forces of Ukraine to which the movement is close, now see the war as the event that triggered a national reawakening, and that prompted many to rediscover their Finno-Ugric heritage rather than simply identifying as Russian.

According to activists, both those in the diaspora and those still living in the region are increasingly prepared to oppose Russia. “The war consolidated the national movement and we’re already seeing its new stage — more organised, purposeful, ready for real changes,” says Volodymyr Grotskov, a representative of the Nord Group.

As Yana Tihonen, another supporter of Karelian independence and the head of the Finno-Ugric human rights organisation RANTA, puts it: “For many people in Karelia, politics used to be something distant that didn’t affect their everyday lives. But the war made them see things in a completely different light.”

Bashkortostan: Into the mainstream

Independence for Bashkortostan, a majority Muslim republic between the Volga River and the Ural Mountains, has gone from being a fringe aspiration to a widely referenced talking point in the past three years, according to Ruslan Gabbasov, an activist who leads the Bashkir pro-independence movement from exile.

While support for an independent Bashkortostan peaked in the early 1990s, it dropped off again under Putin’s rule, only to have been reawakened in recent years due to widespread popular resentment at Moscow’s policies towards the republic, which have been further exacerbated by the problems caused by the war, such as mobilisation, economic hardship and growing repression.

Evidence that Russia’s mobilisation policy disproportionately drafts ethnic minorities into the military has become a particular source of resentment in the region, and in 2024, for the second year in a row, more conscripts from Bashkortostan were killed in Ukraine than from any other region of Russia, despite the fact that it has just a third of Moscow’s population. This is only compounded by the long existing resentment felt towards the federal centre for enriching itself through the exploitation of Bashkortostan’s valuable natural resources.

Bashkortostan has also been subjected to intense Russification policies, which have seen the mandatory teaching of the Bashkir language scrapped and a reduction in the airtime set aside for Bashkir-language content on the region’s television channels.

However, Gabbasov remains upbeat in the face of the intensified political persecution and increased attacks on any expression of national identity, and calls the Russification attempts futile. “Bashkirs have always felt themselves to be Bashkir, not Russian,” Gabbasov says, “The more pressure they feel, the more they resist.”

Bashkir activists work both in the region itself as well as among the Bashkir diaspora abroad to promote the idea of independence for Bashkortostan, raising awareness about the repressive situation at home for those living abroad, while also encouraging support for Ukraine.

Convinced that the Russian government’s collapse is inevitable, Gabbasov argues that a further deterioration of the economic situation will push more and more people in the region to embrace Bashkir independence. “Power in Russia is strictly personal. The collapse will come immediately after Putin dies or resigns. At that point, a window of opportunity will open for a short time, which we must take advantage of.”

Kuban: Forged in fire

Several movements advocating for Cossack independence were formed in the aftermath of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Though there is much debate about whether Cossacks constitute a social class or a distinct ethnic group, they are synonymous with southern Russia’s Kuban region, for their fierce fighting skills — which historically made them highly desirable mercenaries — and the wide autonomy they were granted by the state during tsarist times.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, independence advocates take the position that Cossacks are a distinct ethnic group, and the leader of one such movement, Saryn Kuchinsky, who is currently serving in the Ukrainian military, credits the war with bolstering their cause. “As an organisation, we came into being thanks to the war. It introduced us all to each other,” he says, describing the creation of Cossack independence group Ezikovy Ertaul. Subsequently, as a direct consequence of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Kuchinsky was one of the founders of the Free Cossack Detachment of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

While, according to Kuchinsky, people in the Russian south grapple with many of the same problems as anybody else in the country: the draining of resources, the siphoning off of money to Moscow, the mobilisation of men to fight in Ukraine, the Russian state is also attempting to engineer a fundamental change in regional identity by implanting the notion that Cossacks have a duty to serve Russia by going to war for it. Government-controlled Cossack organisations are used to promote the idea of serving the state, and oblige their members to join law enforcement agencies or the military.

Kuchinsky says he believes that regional identity in Russia is stronger than many realise and that many prefer to view themselves as belonging to a region rather than being part of an all-Russian group, even if they’re not actually Cossack themselves.

In the current political climate, supporters of Cossack independence see armed resistance as the only practical way to oppose the government and bring about their ultimate objective of a decentralised state in the Russian south. Despite much of the population being apolitical, activists report that the tide appears to be turning on that point. “We have yet to explain our ideas to the general public. But work is underway and there’s a positive trend. It’s especially great to see people who already share our views join us,” Kuchinsky says.

The cells are biding their time, hoping to begin armed resistance to Moscow at the appropriate time, namely when Putin dies or resigns.

Yugsara Polumyan, founder of another Cossack independence movement called Sichovy Ertaul, says that in addition to creating armed cells in the Kuban region, which is obviously done in strict secrecy as the Russian security services are constantly monitoring the region for separatist tensions and persecuting dissidents, activists also work outside Russia.

The cells are biding their time, hoping to begin armed resistance to Moscow at the appropriate time, namely when Putin dies or resigns. Last year, the Free Cossack detachment took part in Ukraine’s operations on Russian territories, bringing them widespread attention.

Polumyan says that he finds organising in exile an important step towards independence that will help prepare for coming home.

“From the very beginning, we set out to build our movement outside of Moscow’s grasp. We are building a state without land and establishing institutions of all kinds: political, economic, social, military. Because if we can’t build in exile, we can’t build in our homeland,” Polumyan says.

Eastern Slobozhanshchina: Dashed hopes

Historically, Russia’s western Voronezh, Belgorod and Kursk regions, all of which border modern-day Ukraine, have been home to a large Ukrainian community, who refer to the area as Eastern Slobozhanshchina. Following the Russian revolution, there was widespread support among Ukrainians in these regions for joining a separate Ukrainian state. However, these hopes were dashed when the regions were swallowed up by the nascent Russian Soviet Socialist Republic instead.

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, few Ukrainians in the region expressed concern at being citizens of Russia rather than their more obvious homeland, as the two newly independent countries still enjoyed close ties with one another. Indeed, though it would be unthinkable today, at the time Eastern Slobozhanshchina had its own Ukrainian-language newspaper, an annual Ukrainian culture festival and even some schools in the Voronezh region which taught Ukrainian to its pupils.

The Russian government’s pursuit of radical anti-Ukrainian policies since 2014 has led to increased concern about the future for ethnic Ukrainians in the region, however. Nina Belyaeva, a lawyer from the Voronezh region, heads a movement dedicated to protecting ethnic Ukrainians living in Eastern Slobozhanshchina. She confirms that Ukrainians living in these borderlands are becoming more interested in the Ukrainian history of their region and in learning Ukrainian as a means to rediscover their heritage.

The Eastern Slobozhanshchina movement was born after the war in Ukraine began in response to the Russian government’s attempts to destroy the Ukrainian community there. Belyaeva says that people who wish to maintain their identity are frequently persecuted, and that their rapidly growing movement seeks to help them.

Activists work to preserve the Ukrainian community’s cultural heritage, to advocate for human rights by supporting political prisoners and working to raise awareness of the region’s deep connection to Ukraine. They also pass information to the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office about cases in which members of the Ukrainian community in Eastern Slobozhanshchina are persecuted.

“Our goal is to preserve and revitalise the national identity of the East Slobozhanshchina Ukrainians. We wish to use the right to self-determination by creating a national autonomy or independence, should the people want it,” Belyaeva says.