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KADYROV, Akhmad Abdulkhamidovich
Former president of the Republic of Chechnya
04/30/2010
Akhmad Kadyrov (Ахмат Абдулхамидович Кадыров) was born in Karagandy in Kazakhstan on August 23, 1951. The Kadyrov family had been deported to Kazakhstan from Chechnya during Stalinist repressions, but was permitted to return in 1957. Kadyrov studied at the Mir-I Arab Madrasah in Bukhara and the Tashkent Islamic University in Uzbekistan in the early 1980s. He founded an Islam Institute in the Chechen village of Kurchaloy in the 1990s.
Kadyrov was a supporter of Dzhokar Dudayev and the Chief Mufti of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria throughout the First Chechen War. He switched to the Russian side at the beginning of the Second Chechen War and was acting head of the Chechen administration from July 2000 until his election as president of the Chechen Republic on October 5, 2003. In May of the following year he was assassinated in Grozny. He was killed by a bomb during a parade to mark victory in World War II.
Kadyrov disapproved of Wahabism, a devout form of Sunni Islam, which originated in Saudi Arabia and was popular among many Chechen rebels. He took a pro-Moscow line during his presidency and backed amnesty campaigns to retrain rebels and allow them to join the Chechen police and military.
The bomb which killed Kadyrov also claimed the life of two bodyguards, the chairman of the Chechen State Council and a Reuters journalist among others.
Kadyrov had four children, three sons and a daughter. All are now dead, apart from his son, Ramzan Kadyrov, who has been president of the Chechen Republic since March 2007.
