“Zelensky received from the government of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria in exile the highest state awards – the Order of Honor of the Nation” (Qoman Sij) and the Order of the Name [первого президента ЧРИ] Dzhokhar Dudayev. […] The awards were personally handed over to the head of state by the head of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, Kyrylo Budanov.
Zelensky’s press service said that he was “recognized for outstanding services and selfless actions for the sake of freedom and democracy throughout the world and for personal services to the Chechen people.”
“His political firmness and loyalty to his native country managed to rally the people of Ukraine in the face of the impending threat from the age-old enemy in the face of Russia and its bloodthirsty monsters who seized power by terrorist methods,” the Presidential Office quoted the resolution signed by the head of the CRI government in exile, Akhmed Zakayev, on November 27, 2022.
According to the press service of the President of Ukraine, the Order of Dzhokhar Dudayev was awarded, in particular, to “Chechen politicians Aslan Maskhadov and Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev, as well as Lithuanian statesman Vytautas Landsbergis.”
The Chechen Republic of Ichkeria is an unrecognized state entity that existed after the collapse of the USSR on part of the territory of the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. From December 1994 to August 1996 there was the First Chechen War, but the Russians failed to take control of the region. The Chechen Republic of Ichkeria ceased to exist in 2000 following the results of the Second Chechen War.
After Russia invaded Ukraine on a full scale in February 2022, on October 18, 2022, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine adopted a draft resolution recognizing CRI as temporarily occupied by the Russian Federation. The Rada also condemned Russia’s genocide of the Chechen people.
In an interview with Ukrinform published on March 25, 2023, Zakayev said that in Ukraine, the armed forces of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria operate as part of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. “This legion, these battalions that we created here, in principle, will become the vanguard of the de-occupation and restoration of Chechen statehood on the territory of Chechnya,” he said.
