Sunzha (until 2016 - Ordzhonikidzevskaya, Ingush.
Ordzhonikidzevski) is a city (since 2016) in the Republic of
Ingushetia of the Russian Federation. The city is located in the
valley of the Sunzha River, 22 km north-east of Nazran and 47 km
west of Grozny (distance by road). The historical core is located on
the left (northern) bank, but currently residential buildings are
spread out on both sides of the river.
To the north is the
treeless Sunzhensky ridge. From the west, the village of Troitskaya
is directly adjacent, to the east is the village of Sernovodskoye,
which is part of the Sunzhensky district of Chechnya. 5 km to the
south, in the foothills, is the village of Nesterovskaya.
The
Sleptsovskaya railway station of the North Caucasian railway is a
dead end on a branch running from the junction station Beslan (North
Ossetia). Previously, there was a direct railway line to Grozny, but
during the hostilities in Chechnya in the 1990s, the route between
Sleptsovskaya and Grozny was destroyed and dismantled.
The
federal highway P217 Kavkaz passes to the south. The Magas airport
is located on the western outskirts.
In the late 1820s - early 1830s, the Ingush were
evicted to the plane through the Assinsky gorge, Ingush villages
were founded in the lower reaches of the Assa and along the banks of
the Sunzha within the current Sunzhensky region of Ingushetia. On
the map of 1834, there is a whole network of Ingush settlements in
these places. In the area of the modern city of Sunzha, the
village of Korey was located. In the report of the Vladikavkaz
commandant Shirokiy dated December 31, 1838, it is designated as
Kurei-Yurt. According to this report, there were 105 households in
the village and 585 people lived. For that time, it was a fairly
large settlement. Also, on the "Map of the Left Flank of the
Caucasian Line" of 1840, this village is designated as Korey-Yurt.
The founder of the village of Kuri-Yurt (Ingush. Kӏuri-Yurt) in
the area of the modern city of Sunzha is called Kuri, the son of
Ali (Ingush. Ialy Kӏuri), from the village of Leymi, from where he
moved to Sunzha in the late 20s or early 30s XIX century. The
descendants of Kuri Aliyev, according to some sources, now live in
the village of Barsuki and bear the surname Kurievs. It is claimed
that the village of Kuri-Yurt existed until 1845. Later German and
British maps from 1855 clearly show that Korei was located on the
right (southern) bank of the Sunzha and therefore was not the direct
predecessor of the Cossack village founded later.
The village
with the name Sunzhenskaya was founded in October 1845, during the
Caucasian War, as part of the Sunzhenskaya cordon line. The villages
of the Sunzhenskaya line were inhabited by the Cossacks from the
already existing villages of the Caucasian line, as well as by the
Don Cossacks. In addition to the Donets and Cossacks from other
villages of the line (from the territories that are now part of the
Krasnodar and Stavropol Territories), people from Ukraine, from the
Voronezh province, who enrolled in the Cossacks, Kazan Tatars and
Poles, settled in Sunzhenskaya.
Sunzhenskaya is located on
the left (northern) bank of the river. Unlike the neighboring
stanitsa Troitskaya, founded in the same 1845, Sunzhenskaya received
a regular layout. The village administration, a chapel were built, a
paramedic appeared, since 1848 - a two-year school.
On
December 29, 1851, by the Imperial Order of Emperor Nicholas I, the
village was renamed into Sleptsovskaya in honor of the participant
in the Caucasian War, Major General N.P.Sleptsov, who had previously
been involved in the construction of the Sunzhenskaya line and, to a
certain extent, had the right to be considered the founder of the
village of Sunzhenskaya (Sleptsov died in December 1851). By 1858,
the village was part of the 1st Sunzhensky regiment of the Caucasian
linear Cossack army, which, being one of the three regiments of the
Sunzha line, united the Cossack villages in the middle reaches of
the Sunzha and Assa, with a branch towards Mozdok (Karabulakskaya,
Troitskaya, Sleptsovskaya, Mikhailovskaya , Assinskaya,
Magomed-Yurtovskaya, Terskaya). Since 1860, the village was part of
the Terek region.
The village was originally built with 250
households. As of 1874, the village had 519 households with 2709
inhabitants, there was an Orthodox church, a post station, a school,
2 tanneries and 1 brick factories, a source of cold mineral water,
on September 1 a fair was held in the village. According to some
reports, another fair was held on March 17. The Sleptsovskiy mineral
springs, located to the east, in the area of the village of
Mikhailovskaya (now the village of Sernovodskoye), were also named
after the village.
Article from ESBE (1900):
Sleptsovskaya
- the village of the Tersk region, Sunzhensky department.
Inhabitants 4226. Orthodox and Old Believer churches, 3 schools,
loan-saving partnership; 5 mills, 6 forges, different workshops -
22, shops - 19. Production of cloth and canvas.
In August
1917, there were clashes between the Ingush and Cossacks of the
villages of Karabulakskaya, Troitskaya and Sleptsovskaya. The
conflict was caused, in turn, by the clashes between the Ingush and
soldiers returning from the fronts of the First World War in
Vladikavkaz on July 6-7. Despite the fact that already on September
15 a "truce" was concluded between the parties, these events
actually became a prologue to bloody battles between the Ingush and
the inhabitants of Cossack villages during the Civil War in the
Caucasus.
Since 1920, the village has been the administrative
center of the Sunzhensky Cossack District (first as part of the
Mountain ASSR, then as part of the North Caucasian Territory). The
district was formed on the basis of the Sunzhensky district, which
previously existed in the Tersk region of the Russian Empire, which
arose in 1905 (de facto, since 1909 - de jure) after the division of
the Cossack-Ingush Sunzhensky department into Nazran (Ingush) and
Sunzhensky (Cossack) proper districts. The Soviet Sunzha district,
like its predecessor, united the Cossack villages in the middle
reaches of the Sunzha and Assa, as well as historically associated
settlements on the Tersk ridge and in the Terek valley (the
Voznesenskaya and Terskaya villages). The overwhelming majority of
the district's population were Russians.
In 1929, the Sunzha Cossack District was abolished, the village
of Sleptsovskaya became part of the Chechen Autonomous District
(since 1934 - the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous District, since 1936 -
the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic). In 1939
Sleptsovskaya was renamed Ordzhonikidze, in honor of the Soviet
statesman Sergo Ordzhonikidze, known as the organizer of the
"decossackization" and forced eviction of Cossacks from a number of
stanitsas of the region (in particular, in 1920, with the active
participation of Ordzhonikidze, the Cossacks were evicted from
stanitsa in the upper reaches of the Sun and its tributaries - on
the territory of modern North Ossetia, as well as from the villages
in the lower reaches of the Sunzha - on the territory of modern
Chechnya).
After the deportation of the Chechens and Ingush
in 1944, the village was part of the Grozny region. After the return
of the Ingush from the Central Asian exile and the restoration of
the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in 1957, in
Ordzhonikidze, as in other Sunzha villages, the share of the titular
population of the republic (Chechens and Ingush) begins to grow, the
share of Russians is falling.
Ordzhonikidzevskaya was the
regional center of the Sunzhensky region of the Chechen-Ingush ASSR.
In the village there was an airfield and other facilities of the
Stavropol Military Aviation School.
Modernity
After the
division of Chechen-Ingushetia in 1992, the border of Ingushetia
with Chechnya lay east of Ordzhonikidze. After the start of the
First Chechen War in the village, as in other settlements of
Ingushetia, camps for internally displaced persons were organized,
in which thousands of refugees from Grozny and other regions of the
neighboring republic lived. During the Second Chechen War, a public
organization of Chechen refugees called the Chechen Committee for
National Salvation (2001) was even created in the camps for migrants
in Ordzhonikidzevskaya.
Since the mid-1990s, the republic has
repeatedly raised the issue of raising the status of the village and
turning it into an urban settlement (which was primarily due to the
large population of Ordzhonikidze, which is atypically large for a
rural settlement). So, in 1994, a proposal to give the status of
cities to the village of Ordzhonikidze and the working village of
Karabulak was expressed by ND Kodzoev, head. sector of history of
the Ingush Research Institute of Humanities named after Ch. E.
Akhrieva. In August 1995, Karabulak was given the status of a city,
then the territory of Nazran was expanded to include five nearby
villages (Altievo, Barsuki, Gamurzievo, Nasyr-Kort, Plievo), but the
issue of Ordzhonikidze was not resolved. In 1995, ND Kodzoev again
voiced his proposal regarding Ordzhonikidzevskaya, but this time it
had no consequences.
In 2002, through deputy I.U. Abadiev, a
proposal to grant the status of the city of Ordzhonikidze was
submitted to the People's Assembly of the Republic of Ingushetia. It
was proposed to give the new city the name Kuri-Yurt. Parliament
discussed this issue, but never resolved it. In October 2004, the
head of the Sunzhensky District Administration A. Zh. Nakastoev
appealed to the President of Ingushetia MM Zyazikov with a proposal
to “unite the villages of Ordzhonikidzevskaya, Troitskaya and
Nesterovskaya, and give the formation the status of a city of
republican subordination, calling it Ordzhonikidze. It was assumed
that if the village of Ordzhonikidzevskaya was given the status of a
city and included in its composition the village of Troitskaya as a
municipal district, then it would be a large city with a population
of about 100 thousand people (population estimates - as of the 2nd
half of the 2000s) ... All these initiatives have never been
implemented.
In the 2000s and 2010s, the Islamist bandit
underground operating in the North Caucasus showed its activity in
the village. In particular, some objects in Ordzhonikidzevskaya were
attacked during the militants' attack on Ingushetia in June 2004. In
the village, there were repeated attacks on law enforcement
officers, terrorist acts, and special operations against militants.
In 2006-2008, in a number of settlements of Ingushetia (the city
of Karabulak, the villages of Ordzhonikidzevskaya, Troitskaya and
Nesterovskaya, the city of Nazran, the village of Yandare), a series
of crimes were committed against Russian-speaking citizens
(explosive devices, arson, shelling and murders). This series
culminated in the events of summer-autumn 2007, when several
high-profile murders, terrorist acts and other crimes were committed
against Russians, Koreans, Gypsies, and Armenians. In particular, in
June 2006, in Ordzhonikidzevskaya, a deputy was shot dead. the head
of the administration of the Sunzhensky district, G.S. Gubina, who
oversaw the program for the return of the Russian-speaking
population to Ingushetia (later one of the streets of the village
was named after her). In July 2007, in Ordzhonikidzevskaya, the
family of the Russian teacher L.V. Terekhina was killed (3 killed),
at whose funeral a terrorist attack was organized (13 wounded). This
series of crimes attracted significant public attention and led to a
new wave of Russian outflows from the republic.
On May 17,
2015, in Ordzhonikidzevskaya, a referendum was held on changing the
status of a municipality from a rural settlement to an urban
settlement. The total voter turnout to vote was 65.66%. 67.56% of
voters voted for endowing the village of Ordzhonikidzevskaya, the
largest settlement in the Sunzhensky region, with the status of an
urban settlement. At the same time, a survey was conducted about the
name. According to the press service of the Head of Ingushetia, the
absolute majority of respondents (63.80%) would prefer the name
"Sunzha".
On June 5, 2015, a law was signed to endow the
village of Ordzhonikidze with the status of an urban-type
settlement. On the same day, a law of the Republic of Ingushetia was
signed on the transformation of the rural settlement
Ordzhonikidzevskoe into an urban settlement. The election of the
head of the new urban settlement took place on a single voting day -
September 13, 2015.
On February 3, 2016, Prime Minister of
the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev signed an order to rename the
urban-type settlement Ordzhonikidzevskaya into the urban-type
settlement Sunzha. In mid-2016, the urban settlement of
Ordzhonikidzevskoe was renamed to the urban settlement of Sunzha.
On November 25, 2016, the head of Ingushetia, Yunus-Bek
Yevkurov, signed the republican laws "On the transformation of the
urban settlement of Sunzha into an urban district" and "On the
transformation of the urban-type settlement of Sunzha in the Sunzha
district of the Republic of Ingushetia." Earlier, in a referendum,
78% of local voters supported the new status. Thus, Sunzha became
the fifth city in Ingushetia. On December 12, 2016, the laws came
into force, the village of Sunzha received the status of a city, the
urban settlement of Sunzha was transformed into an urban district
and removed from the Sunzha district.
Temple in
honor of the Protection of the Most Holy Theotokos.
The first
Pokrovsky temple, which existed in the village of Sleptsovskaya, was
built in 1854 and consecrated on the patronal feast day on October 1
(14). The confessional paintings for the stanitsa Orthodox parish
have been compiled since 1846. In 1886, a parish school was opened
at the church. At the beginning of the 20th century, the church was
closed due to dilapidation; on June 24, 1902, the prayer house was
consecrated.
Sources that mention the current Intercession
Church usually state that the former temple was destroyed in the
1930s. Since about the 1950s, services have been held in a
meetinghouse, which was later rebuilt into a small church. At the
same time, on the veneration cross installed in the courtyard of the
current church, it is indicated that it was installed on the site of
the altar of the Intercession Church, founded in 1912. Perhaps, in
this case, we are talking about a meeting house, consecrated in 1902
(with an error in the date), or in 1912 this meeting house was
actually converted into a church. Another plausible explanation is
that in the 1950s the prayer house was built in the building of a
former Old Believer church. After the completion of the construction
of the present temple, the former church (prayer house) was
dismantled.
The construction of the existing large
Intercession Church began, as is usually indicated, in 2004. During
construction, it was repeatedly shelled (as it is believed, from the
Islamist militants operating in the republic). On June 9, 2012,
during the celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Republic of
Ingushetia, the temple was opened. In the presence of Yu.B. Evkurov,
A.G. Khloponin, S.V. Stepashin, V.G. Zerenkov, Archbishop of
Chelyabinsk and Zlatoust Theophanes, Abbot of the Savior
Transfiguration Monastery of Murom Varlaam (former rector of the
stanitsa church), Archbishop Zosima of Vladikavkaz and Makhachkala
performed the rite of small consecration of the temple. The great
consecration took place on the patronal feast of the Protection of
the Most Holy Theotokos on October 14, 2012. It was chaired by
Archbishop Zosima in the presence of the Head of Ingushetia Y.B.
Yevkurov.
The parish of the church is part of the Makhachkala and Grozny
dioceses, which is headed by the former rector of the Intercession
Church, Bishop Varlaam (Ponomarev). For some time, the rector of the
stanitsa church was also Archpriest Pyotr Sukhonosov, kidnapped and
killed by the militants.
New Sinai Monastery.
On March 19,
2014, the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church approved the
decision to create a New Sinai Monastery on the basis of the
bishop's courtyard of the Church of the Intercession of the Most
Holy Theotokos. The ruling bishop of the Makhachkala and Grozny
dioceses, Bishop Varlaam, became the abbot of the monastery. The New
Sinai monastery is the only male monastery within the diocese.