Chechens
Chechens (; '; Old Chechen: Нахчой "Naxçoy") are a Northeast Caucasian ethnic group of the Nakh peoples originating in the North Caucasus region of Eastern Europe. They refer to themselves as Vainakhs (which means "our people" in Chechen) or Nokhchiy (pronounced ; singular Nokhchi, Nakhchuo or Nakhtche). Chechen and Ingush peoples are collectively known as the Vainakh. The majority of Chechens today live in the Chechen Republic, a subdivision of the Russian Federation.
Borozdinovskaya operation
Borozdinovskaya is a large village in Shelkovsky District, close to the border with Dagestan near Chechnya's easternmost point, with a predominantly Avar (a Dagestani people) ethnic minority population of around 1,000 people. According to residents of Borozdinovskaya, the ethnic conflict in the area began in the mid-1990s during Chechnya's "de facto" independence, when many ethnic minorities such as Dagestanis and Russians were being discriminated against by the Chechens, or otherwise pressured to leave by the poor economic conditions and destruction resulting from the First Chechen War. A local Avar strongman named Shapi Mikatov created an armed militia that effectively protected the village from what they called the 'Chechen gangs,' including the men of Sulim Yamadayev, at the time considered most powerful separatist warlord in eastern Chechnya. According to Hussein Nutayev, the pro-Russian head of Shelkovsky District in 2004, Mikatov's militia was rather "a criminal group we call the Avar jamaat ... headed by the infamous warlord Mitabov, who is accused of numerous murders and kidnappings." Mikatov was allegedly killed in 1998, and the following year the Yamadayev brothers accepted an offer to lead the Special Battalion Vostok, effectively changing sides in the conflict from the separatist side to the Russian side. The Special Battalion Vostok was a predominantly ethnic Chechen Spetsnaz unit of the GRU, the Russian foreign military intelligence agency, and operated throughout eastern Chechnya. Since then, residents claimed they began to be targeted by pro-Russian Chechen forces, and the inter-ethnic tensions escalated further when Chechen authorities began resettling displaced persons from Nozhay-Yurtovsky District in the village.