PSCRP-BESA Reports No 28 (January 14, 2024)
“Sakha” is the endonym of the Yakuts, a Turkic people whose ancestors migrated to what is now Yakutia in the 14th-15th centuries, partly displacing, partly assimilating the Evenks, who had moved into the area earlier and who spoke the language of the Tungus-Manchurian group, and the aboriginal Yukagir tribes. In the 17th century Russians entered Yakutia and after decades of armed struggle conquered it. In the 18th century, most Yakuts were nominally Christianized, resulting in the spread of Russian names and surnames among them.
Today, the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) is the largest subject of the Russian Federation in terms of territory. Its area covers 3 million 83 thousand 523 square kilometers. It is noticeably larger than the area of Argentina (2 million 780 thousand square kilometers), which ranks eighth among the countries of the world by territory. At the same time, economically it is one of the most important donor regions of the Russian Federation. It concentrates colossal deposits of natural diamonds (more than 90% of all diamonds mined in Russia and about a quarter of those mined in the world come from Sakha), gold, uranium, oil, gas, coal and other minerals.
Most of the revenues from the extractive industry of Sakha go to Moscow — to the federal budget or to private companies linked to the federal authorities. This gives local activists grounds to argue that the relationship between Moscow and the Sakha Republic is essentially that of a home country and a colony. The tremendous gap between the huge revenues of the extractive and manufacturing industries of Sakha and the actual standard of living and quality of life of the vast majority of the region’s population remains a breeding ground for separatist sentiments. Thus, in 2023, according to official data, the republic’s income amounted to $23.5 billion, while more than 15% of the population lived below the poverty line.
In April 1922, at the end of the Russian Civil War that followed the October Revolution of 1917, the Bolsheviks proclaimed the Yakut Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. At the same time, armed uprisings of opponents of the Soviet power continued in the region until 1930.
Before the collapse of the USSR, the authorities actively engaged in attracting newcomers to Yakutia, primarily as labor force in the extractive and manufacturing industries. As a result, the share of Yakuts in the republic’s population decreased from 82.6% in 1926 to 33.4% in 1989. However, after 1991, the absolute number of immigrants (primarily Russian) in Yakutia and their share in the total population rapidly declined, mainly due to their departure for economic reasons. No serious interethnic clashes were recorded in Yakutia in the 1990s.
The continuing relatively high birth rate has also contributed to the growth of the share of the indigenous population. As of 2021, 55.5% of the population of the Republic of Sakha was Yakut, 32.3% Russian, and 4.5% highly Yakutized Tungus-Manchurian peoples, Evenks and Evens. It should be noted that mixed-race people known as “Sakhaliars” are usually referred to as Russians, although many, if not most of them, are culturally and linguistically closer to Yakuts than to Russians.
Compared to most other languages of the national republics that are part of the Russian Federation, the Yakut language holds a very strong position. The Republic of Sakha is among those subjects of the Federation that have preserved school education in the local language, including in the urban areas. There are half a million Yakuts, but those who study in Yakut make up 17% of all non-Russian students in the Russian Federation. By comparison, those whose language of instruction is Tatar make up only 9.6% of all non-Russian students, although there are about 5 million Tatars. The Yakut language is also taught in the majority of schools in the republic whose language of instruction is Russian. The overwhelming majority of Yakuts not only speak Yakut, but also consider it their native language. In addition, during the 2010 census 17,016 Evenks, 9,848 Evens, 1,308 Russians, 148 Buryats and 132 Tatars named Yakut as their native language. A number of newspapers and magazines are published in the Yakut language, as well as electronic media. Cinematography in the Yakut language has reached a relatively high level of sophistication, unparalleled among other minority languages of Russia.
The ethnic peculiarity of the Republic of Sakha is also emphasized by local holidays celebrated officially on the republican level: February 13 — Day of Native Language and Script, April 27 — Day of the Republic of Sakha (in 1992 the Constitution of the Republic of Sakha came into force on this day), July 1 — National Press Day (on this day in 1907 the first Yakut newspaper “Sakha doiduta” was published), Olonkho Day (Yakut national epic, which in 2009 was put on the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage list), etc. The indigenous pagan summer holiday Ysyakh, celebrated on June 21, occupies a special place in the shaping of Yakut ethnic and national-civic identity. (According to official data, 220,000 people out of 1 million of the republic’s total population took part in the celebrations in 2022).
Nominally, the majority of Yakuts belong to the Orthodox Church, but in general, the indigenous population of the Republic of Sakha enjoys a situation of religious syncretism, with room for traditional beliefs. Since the late 1980s, a number of Yakut intellectuals have initiated the revival of traditional Yakut religion in the form of neo-paganism. With the total share of believers in the republic estimated at 43.8% (as per the 2020-2021 survey), 6% of respondents called themselves followers of the officially registered “traditional Yakut religion Aar Aiyy”. Another 20.1% described themselves as adherents of shamanism and paganism, and 2.3% as adherents of Tengrianism (an ancient Turkic religion).
In light of the high level of national self-consciousness of Yakuts and the long-standing traditions of the Yakut national movement, the beginning of Russia’s full-scale aggression against Ukraine in 2022 triggered the development of a movement for full state independence of Sakha, closely linked to the anti-war movement. Almost immediately after the outbreak of the full-scale war, Yakut activists who had left Russia established the anti-war foundation Free Yakutia, advocating in Russian and Yakut languages. In August 2023, the Sakha independence movement “Resistance” was established through the initiative of Raisa Zubareva, a Yakut journalist in exile. Since the movement proclaims as one of its main principles that “any citizen of the Republic of Sakha, regardless of ethnicity, can become a member of the movement,” it automatically broadens its base and alleviates potential tensions between the indigenous and non-indigenous populations, i.e., primarily between Yakuts and Russians.
Predictably, the pro-Russian Federation authorities of the Republic of Sakha actively supported the beginning of the full-scale aggression against Ukraine. The Yakut volunteer unit “Bootur” was organized, while pro-government media of the republic are trying to spread the false narrative that presents Yakutia, the Caucasus republics and, to a lesser extent, Bashkiria and Tatarstan as “regions whose culture is closely connected with war and where professional warriors live” and, accordingly, justifies mass mobilization of representatives of national minorities to the front. However, in recent months the opposition has been trying to create a Yakut unit in the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU). These volunteers, in their own words, “came to Ukraine to help and gain experience to fight for the liberation of their native lands” (emphasized by the author).
If the federal center is weakened, it is likely that the Republic of Sakha will be among the first contenders for independence among the subjects of the Russian Federation. The combination of a high level of national self-consciousness and political organization with huge material resources and a clear interest of both the local population and local elites not to support Moscow at their own expense makes such a scenario very plausible. The fact that in addition to mining and mineral processing, Yakutia has sufficiently developed industries such as energy and agriculture, as well as local scientific institutes and higher educational institutions, suggests that it will be able to exist independently.
A significant problem of a hypothetical independent Republic of Sakha may be the difficulty of entering the world market due to the lack of external borders with foreign countries. However, Yakutia has access to the Arctic Ocean (its main port is the township of Tiksi). Navigation on the Arctic Ocean may become much easier with global warming, which will open up relatively short routes from Yakutia to the USA and Canada. Although the Yakut national movement at this stage makes no territorial claims to neighboring subjects of the federation, the solution to this problem could be the Sakha ‘s access to the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk, which would open a shortcut to Japan. The historical precedent already exists, as in the early 20s of the past century Okhotsk uyezd, now Okhotsk municipal district of Khabarovsk Krai, was part of Yakutia Oblast. Since 1992, its population has been steadily declining, and as of 2023 it has only 6,083 people, about a quarter of whom are Tunguso-Manchurian peoples (mainly Evens and Evenks) and Yakuts. In the 1990s, the Okhotsk port was relegated to the status of a seasonal destination.
In the Israeli context, the issue of the hypothetical independence of Sakha is interesting, first of all, in the sphere of supplying natural diamonds to the world market, since the largest diamond exchange operates in Israel. The question of where the uranium mined in Yakutia will be exported is also of interest in terms of security. The presence of a small but firmly rooted Jewish community in Yakutsk may contribute to the development of ties between Israel and Sakha.
It is clear that, so far, all these considerations are purely theoretical. However, the past two decades shows that the seemingly steady situation in Russia can change in the most unexpected ways.