Prigorodny District (Russian: При́городный райо́н) is one of the eight districts of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania, Russia. It is located along the eastern border of the republic.
Unlike the rest of the republic where Ossetians account for the majority of the population, the district is inhabited mainly by the Ingush people. The district is considered a troublesome zone of the republic due to the high tensions between the Ingush and Ossetians.
Prigorodny District used to be a part of Ingushetia (which was a part of Chechen-Ingush ASSR at that time), but it was transferred to North Ossetia in 1944 after the dissolution of the Ingush autonomous territory, when Stalin accused the Ingush of collaborating with the Nazis and deported the entire population to Central Asia. This led to the present-day tensions, which started after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
Tensions between the Ingush and Ossetians rose and fell through the 1970s and 1980s but exploded into the open with perestroika. Mass demonstrations and growing unrest led the Ossetian authorities to declare a state of emergency in Prigorodny in April 1991. Intercommunal violence rose steadily in the area of Prigorodny east of the Terek River, despite the introduction of 1,500 Soviet interior troops to the area.
During the summer and early fall of 1992, there was a steady increase in the militancy of Ingushetian nationalists. At the same time, there was a steady increase in incidents of organized harassment against Ingushetian inhabitants of North Ossetia by their Ossetian neighbors and police. Ingush militants marched to take control over Prigorodny District and on the night of October 30 1992, open warfare broke out and lasted till November 6. While Ingush militias were fighting the Ossetians in the district and on the outskirts of the North Ossetian capital Vladikavkaz, Ingushtians from elsewhere in North Ossetia were forcibly evicted from their homes. Russian interior forces actively participated in the fighting and sometimes led Ossetian fighters into battle.
On October 31, a high-level Russian delegation arrived to stop the violence; however, the first deployment of Russian peacekeepers did not begin until early November.
Although Russian troops often intervened to prevent horrendous acts of violence by Ossetian police and republican guards, the stance of the Russian peace-keeping force as such was strongly pro-Ossetian not only objectively as a result of its deployment, but subjectively as well. President Boris Yeltsin issued a decree that the Prigorodny District was to remain part of North Ossetia on November 2.
The hostilities and reprisals in North Ossetia produced approximately 590 deaths, 1000 injured, 1200 hostages, 40-60,000 Ingush and 9,000 Ossetian refugees.
Although pressure from Moscow and Russian-brokered Ossetian-Ingush agreement of 1995 finally induced the North Ossetian authorities to allow Ingush refugees from four settlements in the Prigorodny District to return to their homes, the return of most refugees has been blocked by the local government and only the Ossetians have been able to return since. Meanwhile, the former-Ingush homes and settlements in the District have been gradually occupied by the Ossetian refugees from Georgia.
On October 11, 2002 the Presidents of Ingushetia and North Ossetia signed The Agreement for Promoting Cooperation and Neighborly Relations between the republics, in which Ingush refugees and human rights advocates invested much hope. However, the Beslan hostage crisis of 2004 hampered the return process and worsened Ossetian-Ingush relations.
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*http://www.db.idpproject.org/Sites/IdpProjectDb/idpSurvey.nsf/wViewCountries/71F4F8A483C24616C12568C1002AFC13
