Ethnic cleansing in the Caucasus

Abstract

Two cases of recent ethnic cleansing in the territories of North and South Ossetia in the Caucasus are examined here, not in order to understand the origins but rather to look at their impact on the communities involved and the degree to which such actions have produced solutions to problems of long standing instead of mere management of them at a tolerable level of violence. With similar clashes likely to occur elsewhere in the territories of the former Soviet Union can any lessons be learned?