Russian Federation: The Mari minority of the Republic of Mari El is politically disempowered and culturally vulnerable

02.02.06

Vienna/Moscow, 1 February 2006. The International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (IHF) and the Moscow Helsinki Group (MHG) today released a 57-page report discussing the human rights situation of the Mari minority of the Republic of Mari El, which is one of Russia’s so-called ethnic regions.

“The Mari minority is largely marginalized in the political process of its titular republic. The national leaders of the minority are persecuted because of their efforts to pursue ethno-political objectives and the broad majority of its members are impoverished and politically disempowered,“ said Aaron Rhodes, IHF Executive Director. He continued, “These circumstances reinforce the vulnerability of the Mari to cultural and linguistic assimilation and render them essentially voiceless in the ongoing process of restructuring the Russian federal system, which may prove to have far-reaching consequences for their legal status and rights.” 

The multinational Russian Federation is constituted by more than 80 regions, some of which are territorially defined, and the rest ethnically based. The ethnic regions are a legacy of the Soviet Union and exist in areas traditionally inhabited by national minorities. The Mari minority is the titular nationality of Mari El, and about half of its 600,000 members are settled in this region.

As in other parts of the Russian Federation, democracy and the rule of law remain weak in Mari El, and over the last few years, freedom of expression has come under growing attack. Journalists, civil society activists and others challenging official policies have increasingly been subject to harassment such as intimidation, arrest, criminal prosecution, eviction and dismissal. Numerous violent attacks against opponents also taken place and have not been effectively investigated or remedied. While the authorities strictly control the information circulated in publicly funded media, all but one independent newspaper have ceased publication.

As the titular nationalities of other ethnic regions, the Mari enjoy a special status in Mari El. The Mari language is a state language next to Russian, and the legislation of the republic obliges the authorities to protect the language, culture and national identity of the Mari. In practice, however, legal guarantees are often not effectively enforced and there are worrisome gaps in the actual protection afforded to the minority. 

Despite its official status, the Mari language is used only to a limited extent within the public sector, and a legally protected right to use the Mari language in contact with authorities is undermined by the fact that public officials are not required to know this language. As in many other ethnic regions of the Russian Federation, comprehensive instruction in the titular language is limited to the primary level, and a majority of all Mari children study the Mari language only as a subject. A special Ministry of Education department in charge of coordinating Mari language programs has been shut down, and a series of small Mari national schools have apparently been closed without due consideration of the wider implications of such measures on Mari communities. TV programs in the Mari language have been cut as a result of changes in the federal programming schedule and only a few books are published in the Mari language every year.

Efforts to improve the protection of the Mari minority are seriously hampered by the fact that the current administration of Mari El is unwilling to acknowledge problems or engage in open debate about minority policies. Unlike his predecessors, President Leonid Markelov, a native Muscovite with an ideological background in the extreme right, has refused to cooperate with the Mari national movement. Involved in peaceful activities to promote the rights of the titular nationality, members of the national movement have been depicted as “nationalists” bent on overthrowing the regime in state-controlled media and have been the targets of a growing crackdown. At the same time, the broad majority of Mari, who typically obtain information only from state-controlled media and are involved in an everyday struggle of getting by, are often ignorant and passive with respect to political matters. In comparison with their share of the general population, ethnic Mari are also underrepresented in the republic’s governing structures. 

Current political and social trends in Mari El serve to undermine the interests of the Mari minority in the political process of the republic and to enhance the vulnerability of its members to continued cultural and linguistic assimilation. As other national minorities of the Russian Federation, the Mari experienced great assimilation during the Soviet era and one fifth or more of all Mari have already lost their own language. Intolerant social attitudes, which leading public officials allegedly have encouraged by making negative remarks, further contribute to reducing the incentive and motivation of Mari to practice their language and culture.

The fact that the Mari have little say in the political process of Mari El is of particular concern in view of the ongoing process of reforming the Russian federal system, a major rationale of which is to create a more uniform state structure and to promote a stronger all-Russia national identity. Efforts to reduce the number of federal subjects and to equalize federal relations pose a particular challenge to the titular nationalities of ethnic regions, such as the Mari. While the protection of the Mari is far from ideal in Mari El, the rights of the minority are better safeguarded in this region than elsewhere in the country and Mari national leaders believe that the survival of the Mari culture and language depends on the retention, and further development, of the status of the Mari as the titular nationality of Mari El. However, President Markelov, who was elected and re-elected with the support of the Kremlin, has not only failed to adequately represent the interests of the Mari vis-?-vis the federal authorities but has also indirectly endorsed eradicating the special status of the Mari in the republic. 

The joint IHF-MHG report, entitled The Human Rights Situation of the Mari Minority of the Republic of Mari El, is largely based on information obtained during an IHF-MHG fact-finding mission to Mari El in late October – early November 2005. It is available in English and Russian at the IHF website, at http://www.ihf-hr.org, and at the MHG website, at http://www.mhg.ru. A 4-page Finnish summary can also be found at the IHF website.

For further information:

Vienna:

Aaron Rhodes,

Henriette Schroeder,

Ann-Sofie Nyman,

Moscow:

Irina Sergeyeva,

Appendix:
IHF Report on the Mari Minority of the Republic of Mari El (Russian Federation)

Source: The International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights