What About Terrorism?
This is a sadly pertinent question for travel almost anywhere in this post-9/11 world. Russia's experiences with terrorism date back to the 19th century, when revolutionary bombers assassinated Czar Alexander II. The source of more recent terrorist attacks has been the war in Chechnya, where a conflict between Russian troops and Chechen guerrillas has simmered for more than a decade. Two major terrorist attacks outside Chechnya in recent years -- the Moscow theater siege in 2002 and the Beslan school massacre in 2004 -- terrified the world and hardened Russian opposition to the Chechen cause. With no end to the conflict in sight, the Chechen problem will continue to cast a shadow over Russia's post-Soviet progress.
The provinces in the Northern Caucasus Mountains neighboring Chechnya are at the most risk of spillover violence that could affect tourists. Moscow, 1,000km (621 miles) to the north, is sheltered from everyday Chechnya-related violence, but as the seat of Russia's government, it is at risk of rare attacks like the theater siege. Like terrorist acts in other European cities, these are nearly impossible to predict and avoid. Most experts judge the terrorism risk in Moscow as no higher than in other major capitals, though if an attack occurs, Russian security services are likely to handle it more ruthlessly than their European counterparts would. St. Petersburg is considered at low risk for terrorism.
See the U.S. State Department's Advisory website www.travel.state.gov for recent warnings, though be aware that they tend to be more alarmist than the travel advisories posted by other governments. If you notice a suspicious abandoned bag on the metro or in a public place, report it to the nearest metro official or police officer.
Staying Safe
The notorious Russian "mafia" made for good movie villains in the 1990s, but its reputation is rather exaggerated and it is not a serious threat to foreign visitors. The victims of most organized crime are Russian millionaires and powerful tycoons who have much more to lose than the average American tourist. Pickpockets and over-friendly drunks are the main annoyances to today's traveler; you can avoid both by being alert, traveling in groups, and sticking to well-lit areas after dark. Prostitution and drug use are illegal but widespread, and not worth a run-in with the Russian police. Drunk-driving laws are strict, forbidding drivers from having even one drink, but traffic police (unfortunately) readily accept payoffs for overlooking minor infractions.
Dealing With Discrimination
The Soviet Union was one of the most ethnically diverse places on the planet, and Russia is still home to hundreds of nationalities. Few Russians can claim to be 100% Slavic, after centuries of mingling with people of Turkic, Nordic, and Mongol blood. However, the two recent wars in Chechnya have fueled a blanket suspicion of people from the Caucasus region, and there have been sporadic incidents of skinhead violence against ethnic minorities in recent years, especially immediately following a terrorist attack. St. Petersburg, despite its cultured reputation, has seen some of the worst attacks, largely targeting vendors and transient workers from Central Asia or the Caucasus. These workers are crucial to the local economy, yet with the Slavic population shrinking, some fringe groups see them as a threat to Russia's identity. Foreigners with "southern" features -- dark eyes and hair and olive skin -- very occasionally suffer reluctant service and suspicious looks, unless it's clear that you're a tourist and not a terrorist. Africans from fellow socialist states were welcomed in the Soviet era, but periodic waves of nationalist sentiment in the post-Soviet era have resulted in backlashes against anyone with black skin, usually in the bleak suburbs where jobless young white men target their even poorer African and Asian neighbors. The majority of Russians do not share this hostility and tourists only very rarely suffer from it, especially those traveling in groups.
Most Russians are eager to criticize the U.S. government for something, but the comments are purely political -- a way of making conversation and demonstrating their knowledge of world events, as opposed to a personal attack. Most interlocutors are happy to talk to a foreigner about current events, even if your views differ, and you'll find pro-Western sentiment as common as anti-Western sentiment.
Chechnya
Chechnya is an uncomfortable subject, and objective information is nearly impossible to come by. Even calling the blood spilling that continues there a "war" can provoke hours of debate. The fate of this region in the Northern Caucasus Mountains is the most controversial subject in today's Russia -- and in many ways, the most important.
Chechens make up one of nearly 100 ethnic groups with no relation to Slavic Russians scattered in the slopes and valleys of the Caucasus Mountains. Russians fought for dominance over the region in the 18th and 19th century, and technically "won" in 1859; but Chechens in particular continued to bristle at Russian rule, and guerrilla bands repeatedly attacked Russian colonizers. During the Russian Revolution and ensuing civil war, the Bolsheviks won over many Chechens with promises of greater autonomy and religious freedom. These promises were quickly forgotten, however, and Chechens staged uprisings against Soviet rule.
Stalin was so panicked by Chechen hostility toward Moscow that he accused the entire Chechen population of collaborating with the Nazis and exiled them all to concentration camps in Kazakhstan in 1944. They were allowed to return home only under Khrushchev's thaw 13 years later, to find Chechnya "Sovietized," with an ethnically diverse population, a university, and a busy airport. The Chechens assimilated back into their homeland, which was by then a province within the Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic. But the indignity of exile remains seminal in Chechens' modern memory, and pent-up rage over that and other Russian offenses simmered for decades. The late-1980s independence movements in other Soviet republics fueled the ambitions of a few Chechens, led by Dzhokhar Dudayev, to establish their own sovereign state. But Chechnya remained a republic within Russia when the Soviet Union collapsed. Dudayev encouraged resistance against Russian police, and amid increasing violence in the region, then-President Boris Yeltsin ordered troops into Chechnya in December 1994.
Neither side seemed ready for what happened next. The Russian army turned out to be so demoralized and financially crippled that its troops succumbed in battle after battle to ragtag Chechen bands. The Russian populace was horrified by the war and the deaths of underfed, underpaid teenage conscripts in pointless firefights. Even Dudayev's death in 1996 didn't improve the Russian forces' lot, and in August that year the two sides signed a peace deal allowing Chechnya greater autonomy. Yet the Chechens proved unprepared to govern themselves, and the republic sank into lawlessness. Reconstruction funds were blatantly embezzled, and kidnapping for ransom became the engine of the Chechen economy (in addition to siphoning oil from pipelines leading out of the Caspian Sea). Nearly no outsiders dared enter the region, whether federal official, journalist, or aid worker.
In August 1999, Chechen bands raided the neighboring Russian republic of Dagestan and seized several villages, pledging to create a regionwide Islamic state. Soon afterward, apartment bombings in Moscow and two other cities killed 300 civilians and terrified the nation. Yeltsin sent troops back to Chechnya, and his new prime minister, Vladimir Putin, successfully "sold" the war to the Russian people, who by then were eager for determined leadership and an end to Chechen crime and terrorism. Putin's popularity soared amid early successes for Russian troops, and within months he had replaced Yeltsin as president.
And the war rages on. Chechnya's remaining warlords continue to stage terrorist attacks on civilian targets, including the hostage-taking in a Moscow theater in 2002 and the seizure of a school in Beslan in 2004, both of which left scores of dead. Such attacks only strengthen Russian resolve against peace talks. The Chechens' funding, which appears steady, is believed to come from various Islamic extremist groups. A decade ago most Chechens were casual in their observance of Islamic custom, but the war has changed that. Many now sport long beards, forego alcohol, and adhere to sharia law.
The Kremlin has claimed for years that Chechnya is "normalized," but Russian police and the Chechens who cooperate with them are killed regularly in guerrilla raids on mountain roads, and Chechen families suffer routine torture in Russian "cleanup operations" on villages thought to harbor rebels. Chechnya's Kremlin-backed president, Ramzan Kadyrov, is widely feared, and his militias are believed to act with impunity against perceived threats. International pressure failed to persuade Putin to rethink his Chechnya policy.
