Requests for comment/POV in Chechen Wikipedia

Add links
From Meta, a Wikimedia project coordination wiki
< Requests for comment
This is an archived version of this page, as edited by Ymblanter (talk | contribs) at 10:57, 27 January 2012 (→‎Statement by Ymblanter). It may differ significantly from the current version.

Statement by Ymblanter

Disclaimer. I am opening this RFC since I was asked by Дагиров Умар for help. I did perform my own research and I give here my opinion, not his (I refer to clear attribution of his opinion when necessary). However, I do not speak Chechen, and I rely on his translations and also on his assessment of the situation in general. I do not want to be involved in the situation, but if necessary I will help through this RFC with translations and providing background information. From what I remember, I have zero contributions to Chechen Wikipedia and I clearly was not involved in the dispute previously, so that I do not think I am biased in any sense. I also do not want my position in the dispute be taken for my political standing. Note that Дагиров Умар does not speak English. --Ymblanter 09:00, 27 January 2012 (UTC).[reply]

Background information. Chechen language is spoken in the en:Chechen Republic. The republic (as a part of the Chechen-Ingush Republic) was part of Soviet Union from the 1950s to 1991, then it experienced two wars with a party claiming an independent state on one side and the pro-Russian party aided by Russian troops on the other side. At some point, much of the area of the republic was controlled by pro-independent forces, but in the end pro-Russian side won, and en:Akhmet Kadyrov was appointed to be the president. After his assassination, his son, en:Ramzan Kadyrov, became the president in the age of late 20s. He remains the president, and any criticism of him in the Chechen Republic may be dangerous to raise. The guerilla war is basically over, but there are ethnic Chechens still supporting the idea of national independence, many of them living in Europe and in the US.--Ymblanter 10:45, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The statement starts. Several days ago, Дагиров Умар (reads as Dagirov Umar) left a question on a Russian village pump in Commons, where I am an active contributor, concerning a specific question on vandalism in Chechen Vikipedia. This is a link to the last message of the tread. He complained, in particular, that existing sysops and bureacrats were inactive, and nobody was fighting vandalism. I suggested him to apply for a temporary adminship and helped him to file a request. The request was eventually granted for three months on January, 20. I must add that even though I knew Umar from the period when I was active in Russian Wikipedia, more than 7 months ago, I never had any previous correspondence with him, nor did I work with him on any common projects. I however had an impression of Umar as of a trustworthy person.

Yesterday evening he sent me a message asking for help and telling me that he was threatened to be blocked in Chechen Wikipedia. Indeed, I discovered that in 2011 the Chechen Wikipedia had rather low activity, with little maintenance work (I did not check statistics though and I might be wrong on this point). From the time Umar got a temporary sysop flag he started maintenance work. This is a typical example of his edits, which comes on top of an article out a village in the Chechen Republic abcreated by another user in November 2011. Whereas I do not speak Chechen and can not understand all the details, I clearly see that, in particular, this edit changed the state attribution of the village, from independent Chechen state to Russian Federation, in the infobox. After a number of these edits, Umar Dagirov got a message on his talk page from Dagger, a sysop who did not edit since February 2011 with the exception of one edit in October 2011. I asked Umar to translate this message into Russian, and this is the translation he provided:

Послушай дружище тут это слово Российское Федерация не пиши, говорю тебе последний раз, если ещё раз в чеч вики напишешь Российское Федерация заблокируем, и выбросим из вики ты должен знать что Чеченское государство Ичкерия признана 3 государствами и не имеет никакого отношение к Российской Федерации кроме границы. БОЛЬШЕ НЕ ПОКАЗЫВАЙ ТАКОЕ НЕ МУЖСКОЕ ПОВЕДЕНИЕ.

My English translation follows.

Listen, do not use here the words "Russian Federation", I am telling this to you for the last time. If ever write "Russian Federation" in the Chechen Wikipedia again, we will block you and through out of the wiki. You should know that Ichkeriya, the (independent) Chechen State, has been recognized b y three states and has no relation to Russian Federation except for the state border. THIS BEHAVIOR IS NOT WORTH OF A MAN

In half an hour, even though Umar Dagirov did not make further edits, Dagger blocked him for the time of indefinite, citing (in Russian) the reason as "adding false information". From the context, it is clear that "false information" is that the Chechen Republic is a part of Russian Federation. Later on, Дагиров Умар unblocked himself, but did not make further edits.

At the same time, Sasan700, a bureaucrat who had no edits since October 2011, deleted a page on Ramzan Kadyrov. I do not know what was on the page, but Umar Dagirov mentioned that it was written there (before he cleaned it up) that Ramzan Kadyrov was born to a pig (obviously a hard insult for a Muslim).

Just to draw an analogy, removing mentioning on Russia it would be the same as if in Spanish Wikipedia an article on en:San Fransisco would state Mexico as a country, and someone after correcting it to the USA would get a warning and then immediately got permablocked.

I thus conclude that currently NPOV is not implemented in the Chechen Wikipedia, and thus the Chechen Wikipedia does not serve the WM mission. This is implemented through a group of users who are admins and bureaucrats there. This is a situation which reminds me the one with the Acxenese Wikipedia in the past.--Ymblanter 10:45, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

My suggestions. First, I think we should have a discussion here. I request stewards to notify the related users in the Chechen Wikipedia (this can be done in English since Sasan700 is a resident of Belgium and claims en-4, and I believe Dagger is also a European resident). I have very little hope that we cold come to any sensible conclusion. In that case, I would suggest to desysop all sysops of the Chechen Wikipedia, and introduce provisional sysops like it was done recently with Mari Wikipedia.

I do not like the situation in General, since Дагиров Умар is a resident of the Chechen Republic, and the name of his account might very well be his real name. In this situation, he is amenable to the Russian / Kadyrov POV, and if he stays as the only admin it could be difficult for him to resist any attempts of the authoritis (if any) to introduce POV. This might be dome much more efficiently in collaboration with European residents. However, demanding that Russia should not be mentioned in the Chechen Wikipedia is in my opinion going over the top. I think this is the instance the Foundation should step in. --Ymblanter 10:45, 27 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Retrieved from "https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Requests_for_comment/POV_in_Chechen_Wikipedia&oldid=3324035"