Ingushetia

Background
Ingushetia, a tiny Russian republic in the volatile and poverty-stricken North Caucasus, borders Georgia to the south and Chechnya to the north and east. While the Ingush have close historical, cultural, and linguistic ties to neighboring Chechens, they have differed greatly in their relationship to Moscow. Ingushetia, in fact, voted in a referendum to form the Republic of Ingushetia within Russia when Chechnya first declared its bid for independence in 1991.

The impoverished republic, however, lives in the shadow of the Chechen conflict, and the violence and lawlessness frequently spill over its border. The war has caused tens of thousands of civilians to flee their homes in Chechnya, and many of these traveled to Ingushetia. The strain on local host communities in supporting so many Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) resulted in a humanitarian emergency. While an estimated 25,000 remain there today, regional authorities began shutting down the largest camps in January 2006 and repatriating the IDPs to temporary shelters throughout Chechnya. While the strain on Ingushetia of hosting so many refugees has now been lessened, the republic will need assistance in rebuilding.

What IMC Is Doing
IMC began working in Ingushetia in spring 2000 to help the already-overburdened health system cope with an inflow of Chechen war IDPs who, at the height of the crisis, nearly doubled the local population of the tiny Russian republic.

Since that time, IMC has continued to provide emergency medical assistance to thousands of displaced Chechens, as well as host families, in village clinics and at spontaneous settlements on farms and in abandoned factories and buildings in Ingushetia. IMC's nine mobile medical teams offer immunizations, child wellness services for children under five years, maternal/child health care, primary health care, reproductive health, and prenatal care for more than 272,000 displaced persons in 37 remote villages and a number of spontaneous settlements in Chechnya and Ingushetia. IMC also donates medication and materials to the medical units it supports, as well as conducts health promotion and disease prevention activities.

Living conditions in the Ingush settlements remain appalling, fueling disease and despair amongst the thousands of war-traumatized Chechens who reside there. In search of shelter, family members have crowded into unheated, abandoned factories, train cars and or other facilities, where food and sanitary conditions are both scarce. To help ameliorate this situation, IMC has worked with community members to establish 15 tent centers, which are used as recreational and communal space for 1,500 IDP families.

Importantly, IMC supports a variety of youth initiatives and income-generation projects aimed at helping the Ingush and remaining Chechen refugees restore their livelihoods. IMC provides seminars on the improvement of living conditions, vocational training courses, and cooperative small business development programs, with a special focus on giving youth and women access to employment opportunities. Working in the notoriously dangerous environment of the Northern Caucasus, IMC remains committed to providing much-needed care and training to the thousands of civilians who have suffered from one of the world's fiercest conflicts.