The Committee of Soldiers’ Mothers of Russia (CSMR)

Early activities and opposition to war in Chechnya

In 1990, some demands, including partial demobilisation of the construction battalions, were conceded by President Gorbachev, but in general, the situation did not improve. CSMR set up a Rehabilitation Centre for soldiers who left the army for health reasons. Its activities expanded and diversified to include the organisation of human rights education for conscripts and their parents, dealing with individual complaints concerning human rights violations, regular inspections of military units, the working out of legislative proposals and the organisation of non-violent public protests.

In November 1994, the war in Chechnya broke out and, as CSMR put it, “the peaceful time for the Committee was over”. They opposed the war from the start, both in itself and for the threat it posed to the new Russian democracy. Their new activities included dealing with individual complaints from soldiers and their mothers and running a weekly ‘School for Conscripts’. They also supervised the special military unit to rehabilitate so-called ‘deserters’, which is under the aegis of the CSMR, and participated in working groups of the State Duma (One of the Russian parliaments’ chambers). In the first six months of the war, the Committee received letters from up to 200 people a day and in the same period, nearly 10,000 people brought their complaints in person.

Advocacy for peace and military reform in Russia

Hundreds of mothers organised by CSMR went to Chechnya to take their sons away from the war. They negotiated with the Chechen army and obtained the release of ‘prisoners of war’. CSMR organised a remarkable ‘March of Mothers’ Compassion’, bombarded the Russian government with statements and petitions, and campaigned for the young men who refused to serve in Chechnya, declaring themselves conscientious objectors. Most controversially, they started a campaign encouraging mothers to support the right of their sons to refuse military service – and they travelled abroad to support the idea of an International Tribunal on Chechnya.

The founders of CSMR were five women – two engineers, a journalist, a teacher and an economist. An all-volunteer organisation with no regular budget, CSMR now acts as the umbrella group for 50 regional organisations of soldiers’ mothers and liaises with others. In 1995, CSMR received the Sean MacBride Award from the International Peace Bureau and an award from the Norwegian Committee on Human Rights.

In the late 90s and beginning of the new millennium, the Soldiers’ Mothers worked to prevent anti-democratic changes in the Russian military legislation by demanding the immediate abolition of involuntary conscription, which “made the army the source of threat to people and society, the source of social tension in Russia”.

In 2003, the Soldiers’ Mothers began a campaign for negotiations with commanders of Chechen armed formations. In 2005, they negotiated in London with representatives of the Chechen side. The ‘London memorandum’, which was signed by both sides, called, among other things, for European participation in the constructive settlement of the Chechen crisis. CSMR intended to broaden the circle of participants in negotiations on peace in Chechnya.