Another mosque may appear in Moscow – in the southern Butovo district. On coordinating this issue with Russian President Vladimir Putin declared head of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov. Will another mosque appear in the Russian capital? – in Russian media hardware.
September 28 after meetings with the president The Chechen leader wrote on his Telegram channel that not everything was included in the transcript of the conversation published on the Kremlin website. According to him, the discussion on the project of a new mosque in Moscow remained behind the scenes. Kadyrov proposed building it in the south of Butovo, on the street named after his father Ahmad-Khadzhi Kadyrov.
The head of Chechnya claims that Putin “stressed the great importance of this project for believers and noted that the issue of building a mosque should have been raised even earlier.” He thanked the president for this “precious gift”.
Kadyrov justified the need to build a mosque in the south of the capital by the high number of Muslims living in Moscow – more than 3 million people. According to him, “often during public holidays, due to the lack of mosques, believers are forced to pray in the street”, which “results in a disruption of municipal services”.
Information site “Muslims in Moscow” reports, that the number of Muslims living in the Russian capital is about 4 million people and that the Russian capital is ahead of “any other European city” in this indicator. In 2019, Ravil Gainutdin, Chairman of the Council of Muftis of Russia claims that at that time more than 2.5 million followers of Islam lived in Moscow.
Kadyrov expressed confidence that the news about the construction of a new mosque in the capital would be warmly received not only by Muslims, but also by Muscovites of other faiths.
How Kadyrov Street Appeared in Moscow
Kadyrov Street, on which the Chechen leader proposes to build a mosque, stretches from Buninskaya Alley to Academician Semenov Street and is located near the Buninskaya Alleya light rail station. Before the name change, these were Proektiruemy Proezd No. 6132 and Proektiruemy Proezd No. 653.
The decision to rename these passages in honor of the Chechen president was taken on August 17, 2004, a few months after the death of Ahmad Kadyrov, the victim of a terrorist attack at the Dynamo stadium in Grozny. The name change decree was signed on August 20. Since Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov was on vacation at that time, the document was signed by Deputy Mayor Valery Shantsev, who served as mayor during the mayor’s absence.
Legislation in the capital allowed naming streets after famous citizens only at least 10 years after their death. As a result, the renaming of two passages on Kadyrov Street violated city law. But Chantsev justified his decision by the fact that Kadyrov died while in office.
Moreover, Chantsev’s decree was in line with the presidential decree on the perpetuation of Kadyrov’s memory: on May 10, Vladimir Putin ordered to name one of the squares in Grozny and a school in Tsentaroi in honor of the late leader of Chechnya, and strongly recommended that the Moscow authorities consider the possibility of similarly perpetuating the name of Ahmad Kadyrov in the Russian capital.
The appearance on Kadyrov Street in the south of Butovo provoked protests from the population: in particular, “popular actions” demanding the cancellation of the decision of the acting governor. veterans of the Chechen War went to the mayor, and residents hung a sign on one of the houses with the alternative name “Pskov Paratroopers Street”. However, the protests were not heeded, and on August 23, during a solemn ceremony, the street was named in honor of Ahmad Kadyrov.
Fifth Mosque of Moscow
There are now four large mosques in Moscow:
The historic Moscow mosque, the oldest in the city, the Moscow Cathedral Mosque in Vypolzovoy Lane (Prospekt Mira metro station), the complex of Inam and Yardam mosques in Otradnoye (also Little Jerusalem or New Jerusalem), the memorial mosque on Poklonnaya Hill.
In 2012, Izvestia wrote that the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of Moscow asked the city authorities to allocate land for the construction of a fifth mosque capable of accommodating 40-60 thousand people – perhaps “one of the largest in the post-Soviet space. There was no mention of a specific location, but the article said it should be a site close to metro and public transportation stops, as well as convenient transportation access personal – for example, not far from the Moscow Ring Road.
At the end of February 2023, the publication “Reedus” without reference to the source reported on plans to build the “largest mosque in the country” near the holy lake in the Kosino-Ukhtomsky district. The article stated that it would exceed the size of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and that its capacity would be 60,000 people. At the same time, the Moscow Construction Department claimed that mosques “are not being built.”
Nevertheless, residents of the Kosino-Ukhtomsky district decided that the mosque was being built on the site between Kosinsky Highway and Saltykovskaya Street, although the construction passport was on the construction fence. The construction of the technological part of the transport interchange hub (TPU) of the metro station on Dmitrievskogo Street is underway there. MSK1 found that people learned about the mosque’s construction “in church” or “from friends.”
District Government and Prefecture of the Eastern District of Moscow to residents’ appeals insured that the TPU project does not provide for the construction of religious facilities. Moskomarkhitektura gave a similar response to Moscow City Duma deputy Evgeny Stupin. He, in turn, told the media that the population of the region is concerned about the fact that a “disproportionate territory” has been allocated to transport hubs, as well as about the position of the authorities, who “neither refute nor confirm the construction projects of transport centers”. A mosque.”
In March 2023, on the Spas TV channel, the director of the destruct ology laboratory of the Moscow State Linguistic University, Roman Silantiev, announced the construction of the mosque: according to his words, the project is known only “to a very narrow circle of people”, even if the question of its implementation is supposed to have already been resolved. Silantiev argued that in Kosino-Ukhtomskoye it was planned to build not just a mosque, but “a whole complex” with a shopping center “to ensure the operation of the mosque”, a madrasa, and a rest house.
First Vice-President of the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of Russia Damir Mukhetdinov then ensured that the organization knew nothing about the project and that it did not have the possibility of building a large religious complex.
After that, MSK1 published excerpts allegedly from the minutes of a meeting of the Moscow planning committee. It follows from the quotes given in the article that an educational and religious institution will appear on the territory of the transport hub on Dmitrievskogo Street. The publication could not confirm or deny the authenticity of the document.
Telegram channel “Attention, Moscow” responded that residents of the Kosino-Ukhtomsky district allegedly received from the Moscow government. He said 9.9 hectares of land would be leased for the construction of a religious, spiritual, and educational center.
Protests against the mosque
Residents of Kosino-Ukhtomskoye in February 2023 started to go out to protest against “marches” against a backdrop of reports on the construction of a mosque in the media and social networks. Among them, activists also launched a petition against the construction of the mosque on the Change.org website.
The appeal to potential signatories stated that the Holy Lake, on the shores of which the mosque is planned to be built, is a “religious and historical shrine of Russia”, which before the revolution was a “serious center of pilgrimage”, and an Orthodox temple is nearby. The authors of the petition expressed fears that with the appearance of the mosque, the lake would become shallower and the region would face an influx of migrants, an increase in crime, and a collapse in traffic.
At the end of March, as reported On the “Attention, Moscow” telegram channel, police arrested an activist who “as a sign of protest” had buried a pig’s head on the construction site. In April, athletes joined the protest. In particular, a video message calling to prevent the construction of the mosque was recorded by professional MMA fighter Maxim Divnich.
“I’m afraid to imagine that somewhere in Grozny or Makhachkala they will build an Orthodox church on a holy place for Muslims. <…> I don’t understand these actions, who accepted this? The Moscow government? I urge all Orthodox Christians to come to this temple, we are obliged to defend our shrines,” he said.
Divnich was supported by MMA fighter Vladimir Mineev, who called for “dealing with those who decide to build a mosque on the site of a Christian shrine”, as such administrative decisions “would fall under the article on hatred interfaith and ethnic. The athlete stressed that he was not opposed to the construction of a large mosque as such, but considered it unacceptable to build it near the “sacred lake”.
The leader of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, called, via his Telegram channel, opponents of the construction of the mosque to go “into the trenches with a machine gun”, calling them “inciters” and accusing them of trying to “please Western interests” to create division among Russians. As an alternative, the Chechen leader proposed bringing criminal liability to activists “as information saboteurs acting to please Satanists.”
“If all these participants in the rally came out with all their hearts and souls with the idea of defending Russian land, then go into the trenches with a machine gun! <…> Take a machine gun, push aside with your shoulder the Muslim who is fighting for you today in the Russian Donbass, and show your patriotism, show by deeds, and not by words or provocations, how much you love your homeland, “says Kadyrov’s message.
Relocation of the site
In April, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin reported in his telegram channel that after appeals from Patriarch Kirill and Chairman of the Council of Muftis of Russia Ravil Gainutdin, it was decided to choose another site for the construction of a religious building.
The mayor clarified that the new site will be located near the Kosino metro station, between MCD-3 Diameter, Moscow High-Speed Diameter and MKAD, within walking distance of the metro and MCD. According to him, there are rumors that an area of 40,000 square meters will be allocated for the mosque. the meters are “incorrect”, since in fact “we are talking about a very modest object of 2.5 thousand square meters. meters.”
“On the one hand, the mosque will not disturb the residents of neighboring houses. On the other hand, it will have good transport accessibility. The area around the mosque will be landscaped and accessible for walking in the same way as in Orthodox churches. Moscow is a multinational and multi-religious city. We have always lived and will live in peace and harmony,” he added.
