Authorities in Kabardino-Balkaria have launched a campaign to give the Ubykhs, a Circassian sub-ethnic group, official small indigenous group status. That special status would allow the Ubykhs to claim many benefits from the Russian government, including property rights in Russia’s Krasnodar region, the homeland the Ubykhs lost in the Russian conquest in the 19th century. The expected benefits for the Ubykhs have generated a variety of responses, and the issue has quickly become politicized. Kabardino-Balkarian social scientists believe that by including the Ubykhs on the list of small indigenous groups it will help preserve and develop the group. The republican …read more
Source: The Jamestown Foundation