CAIRO,
January 14 (IslamOnline.net) – Russia's idiosyncratic loyalist
strongman in Chechnya, a largely Muslim republic that has been
embroiled in a brutal on-off war with Russia since 1994, believes the
country needs to legalize polygamy to replenish its war-ravaged
population.
"I
think that it is necessary because we are at war. It is very important
for the Chechen people," Britain's The Independent
reported Saturday, January 14, quoting acting Chechen Prime Minister
Ramzan Kadyrov.
He
said every Chechen man can have up to four wives if he is able to
support them.
"Shari`ah
law allows this, it does not run counter to it. Therefore, each man
who can provide for four wives should do it."
Islam
permits the Muslim to marry more than one woman, a maximum of four, in
order to resolve some very pressing human problems, individual as well
as social.
Outnumbered
The
pro-Moscow official stressed his proposal does not mean changing the
country's laws.
"Every
person decides for himself how he lives. He is the master. He
determines the rules. I'm sure we're not going to interfere in his
personal life."
Polygamy
is illegal in Russia but is reported to be informally tolerated in
Muslim republics such as Ingushetia and Dagestan as well as Chechnya.
Kadyrov,
the son of a former pro-Moscow president killed in a bomb attack, said
the promotion of polygamy was needed to address the gender imbalance
caused by war.
He
said the number of women in Chechnya was between 9 and 18 per cent
higher than the number of men.
Support
Kadyrov
said Chechen President Alu Alkhanov and parliament had supported his
idea.
"We
will develop the traditions of our ancestors," he added.
Previous
attempts to introduce the practice across the country have failed in
parliament.
The
official Chechen leader is President Alkhanov, but Kadyrov is seen as
the power behind the scenes and is supported by Russian President
Vladimir Putin.
His
polygamy proposal also received welcoming from Russian State Duma
Vice-Speaker Vladimir Zhirinovsky.
"We
should welcome this initiative and apply it throughout Russia, because
we have ten million single women," Zhirinovsky said.
The
nationalist Russian MP who has long campaigned for the introduction of
polygamy to tackle Russia's demographic crisis.
Years
of fighting between independence-seekers and Russian forces, poor
health care and migration have robbed Chechnya of many young men.
The
small mountainous Caucasus republic has been ravaged by conflict since
1994, with just three years of relative peace after the first Russian
invasion of the region ended in August 1996 and the second began in
October 1999.
It
was on December 11, 1994 that former Russian president Boris Yeltsin
ordered Russian troops into Chechnya to subdue an increasingly
powerful separatist movement.
After
two years of horrific fighting, Russian troops pulled out in 1996.
In
1999, then-prime minister Putin pushed some 80,000 Russian troops into
Chechnya in what Moscow called a lightning-strike “anti-terror
operation” but which has since degenerated into a grinding war with
Chechen fighters.
At
least 100,000 Chechen civilians and 10,000 Russian troops are
estimated to have been killed in both invasions, but human rights
groups have said the real numbers could be much higher.
Thousands
of refugees from war-torn Chechnya live in battered tent camps in
neighboring Ingushetia and refuse to return home because of continuing
insecurity.
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