Translated material
Nokhchiy-Cho?
President Alkhanov does not like the name of his republic
The President of the Chechen Republic Alu Alkhanov, who was in St. Petersburg at a meeting of the Russian-Arab Business Council, unexpectedly proposed renaming his region. In his opinion, the name Chechnya, “which has been assigned to the republic in recent years,” sounds somewhat dissonant, contains a negative connotation, is perceived negatively and has no legal basis. “I have always said that the name of the Chechens is Nokhchi. Let it be the Nokhchiin Republic,” the president said and added somewhat vaguely: “I gave our specialists certain instructions, and then we will think about what name our republic will have.”The name Chechnya really “has no legal basis” - in the Constitution of the Russian Federation this entity is designated as the Chechen Republic, and in the republican constitution - the Chechen Republic (Nokhchiin Republic). However, the familiar word “Chechnya” did not appear in recent years. At first, the Russians called the Chechens the Shibutz people. But the usual designations - Chechens, Chechens, and the country - Chechnya - arose during the time of the first contacts and the first clashes. That is, hardly later than the 16th century. These words, according to one version, go back to the Arabic “sasan”: this is what Arab geographers of the 13th century called the people who lived in the Dzheirakh, Argun and Vedeno gorges, exactly on the site of present-day Chechnya and Ingushetia.
The self-name of the Chechens - Nokhchi - is found in Georgian chronicles from the time of St. George the Illustrious - this is the first half of the 14th century. After Chechnya was included in Russia, this ethnonym was retained exclusively “for internal use”: in official maps and documents in both imperial and Soviet times, Chechens remained Chechens. The self-name returned to official use only in November 1990. The first congress of the Chechen people, ironically gathered in the Grozny circus, adopted the Declaration of Sovereignty of the Chechen Republic Nokhchiy-Cho (literally - Chechen country, Chechen state). Four days later, the Supreme Council of the Checheno-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic adopted a similar declaration: Checheno-Ingushetia lost its autonomy status and theoretically became equal in rights with the union republics of the USSR. This subsequently gave the separatists a legal basis to claim that Chechnya was never part of the Russian Federation.
In 1991, the Supreme Council of Checheno-Ingushetia was overthrown. In 1992, the Republic of Ingushetia emerged as part of the Russian Federation, and in 1993, virtually independent Chechnya announced its next renaming to the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria. Document forms were then printed in Chechen, sometimes in Cyrillic, sometimes in Latin - “Nokhchiin Republic of Ichkeria.” The name Ichkeria, still used by bitter separatists, actually refers to one of the foothill regions of Chechnya, so it has always been criticized for its geographical narrowness. For example, the supra-Terver, lowland Chechens never considered themselves Ichkerians. Nevertheless, the name Chechen Republic of Ichkeria found its way into Article 65 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, adopted on December 12, 1993 by referendum, which was held everywhere except Chechnya.
Article 65 of the Constitution, which actually contains the list of subjects of the Russian Federation, was changed several times. By law, the name of a region can be changed by presidential decree after a decision has been made locally. It is characteristic that Kalmykia and Chuvashia, for example, abandoned the second name in the language of the indigenous population and limited themselves to the Russian name. In 1996, the Ingush Republic became the Republic of Ingushetia, the Republic of North Ossetia received the addition of Alania, and the Republic of Kalmykia lost its self-name Khalmg Tangch. In 2001, the Chuvash Republic changed its second name Chavash Republic to Chuvashia, and in 2003 the historical Yugra was added to the name of the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug.
The Chechen Republic ceased to be Ichkeria without a special presidential decree. Included in the Constitution of the Russian Federation on paper earlier than in fact, it only adopted a new fundamental law in 2003, which consolidated its territorial affiliation. By the way, it contains two equivalent names: the Chechen Republic and the Nokhchiin Republic.
The idea of renaming Chechnya in connection with the negative associations caused by two wars, massive violations of human rights and a protracted political crisis has already been expressed by some Chechen politicians. Probably, the fact that Mr. Alkhanov remembered this idea at the Arab-Russian business forum indicates the desire of the republican authorities to improve the investment image of the region through more professional naming. True, Russian politicians and experts were skeptical about the renaming. “The republic currently faces many tasks that need to be addressed, and renaming is not the main one,” said Russian Presidential Envoy to the Southern Federal District Dmitry Kozak.
As for the cacophony of the name Chechnya, the famous field commander Shamil Basayev, who was killed last summer, was the first to speak about it. The name Chechnya offended his ethnic self-awareness to such an extent that in his speeches he began to refer to Russia only as Rusnya.