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and the already high levels of unemployment suggest that the majority of the refugees will not be
integrated into the North Ossetian economy.
The refugee crisis in the North Caucasus has exacerbated the general problems posed by
high rates of unemployment in the region. These include: the strain on local housing and
infrastructure; the accompanying threat of epidemics; the rise in crime and social unrest that results
from the enforced idleness of young, healthy males; the threat perceived by residents of the republics
from newcomers ‘stealing their jobs;’ and the additional burden placed on the state and the welfare
system at a time of economic crisis. The inability of local governments to deal with the scale and the
seriousness of this problem owing to a lack of resources and trained cadres is a consequent threat to
regional stability. Discontent with the government and the frustration among refugees, registered in
Dzutsev’s survey, has led to the establishment of opposition movements among refugees agitating
for the resolution of their status in North Ossetia and other republics.
The frustration among the Ossetian refugees is shared by their hosts. At a time of economic
and political crisis and fierce competition over scarce resources, common ethnic heritage is no
guarantee of harmonious relations. This is confirmed by recent reports from North Ossetia which
suggest that residents of the republic associate the deteriorating economic situation and its attendant
rise in crime with the influx of refugees. 166 In February 1995, under pressure from the indigenous
population, the Central Electoral Commission of North Ossetia denied forced migrants and refugees
the right to vote in the March 1995 parliamentary elections, depriving several former refugees who
were already registered as candidates of critical support.
Pushing the refugees to the margins of the political process in such a manner seems more
likely to encourage the polarization of North Ossetian society and politics than to assuage the fears
of the ‘indigenous’ Ossetian population––especially given the fact that the majority of Ossetian
refugees show no desire to return to South Ossetia and there is, in any case, no official provision for
their repatriation. In this regard, North Ossetia serves as a mirror for all those republics and krais in
the North Caucasus that have taken in large numbers of refugees from the region’s many conflicts.
The War in Chechnya and the Problem of Refugees:
The refugee crisis in the North Caucasus has been greatly aggravated by the war in
Chechnya. By June 1995, according to the Russian Federal Migration Service, the war in Chechnya
had added 380,000 refugees and forced migrants to more than 130,000 already officially registered
in the North Caucasus before December 1994 (of whom over 80,000 were already from Chechnya).
By the end of April 1995, an estimated one third of the Chechen population (450,000) had become
refugees, most of them (360,000) scattered throughout the North Caucasus and elsewhere in the
Russian Federation. 167
166 CMG Bulletin, June 1995, p.51.
167 OMRI Daily Digest, No. 86, 3 May 1995.
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