With one video, Russia’s Chechnya problem seizes the spotlight again
When Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov posted a video on his Telegram channel last week that showed his teenage son brutally beating up a Russian prisoner, Mr. Kadyrov said he was “proud” of his son’s actions.
But many Russians were shocked, and the Kremlin was visibly irritated.
The episode is just the latest of many in recent years to highlight the basic conundrum at the heart of the arrangement ending a decade-long cycle of wars between Russia and the formerly separatist Caucasus republic.
Russia’s military devastated and , and the Russian government expended. But Moscow did little to reintegrate the republic with Russia’s constitutional order, and instead left Chechnya in the hands of a leader who swore fealty to Russia but otherwise had a free hand to run the republic as he wished.
