On face, the referendum held in Chechnya on March 24, 2003, seems like a hopeful sign. By a broad margin—Russian election officials reported roughly 95 percent of voters in favor—Chechens approved a Kremlin-backed draft constitution that would make Chechnya permanently and immutably subordinate to Russia. Russian President Vladimir Putin, seeking an end to the most recent four-year conflict, called the vote the resolution of “the last serious problem regarding Russia’s territorial integrity.”

But below the surface, this “progress” only bodes greater instability in Russia’s renegade republic. International observers and foreign reporters—those who were allowed to view the proceedings at all—remain suspicious of voting irregularities, coercion, and electoral fraud. And much as most Chechens want to see an end to the dislocation of their region, it is unlikely that such a broad swath would agree to give up Chechnya’s long-standing claims to independence. The referendum is but one example of the Russian orchestrations in Chechnya, which have stymied any possible peace in the region.

Likewise, in Chechnya’s October 2003 presidential elections, the question is not whom the Chechen people will choose, but whom the Kremlin will pick. That impression was reinforced in mid-September 2003, when two leading candidates abruptly dropped from the ballot, which will likely clear the field for the current Russia-appointed leader, Akhmad Kadyrov, to win the election.

As Russia implements measure after authoritarian measure to gain control in Chechnya, the republic only becomes more volatile. Though Chechens generally practice a moderate form of Islam, fundamentalist Islamic militants known as Wahhabis have infiltrated the region in recent years. The result is a radicalized rebel population that has proclaimed Chechnya’s struggle for independence as a jihad, a holy war against Russian infidels. Extremist Islamist organizations have provided outside aid to Chechen guerrillas, with both training and financial backing coming from sources in the Middle East. Rebels derive most of their funding, however, from criminal activities that include drug trafficking and oil smuggling. Kidnappings for ransom are another large source of illegal income in Chechnya, where thousands of people have gone missing.

The war in Chechnya officially ended with the March 2003 referendum, but the violence in Chechnya has not abated. Chechen fighters have continued attacks on Russian targets, and the rise of suicide bombings by the Chechen rebels is a particularly worrisome sign, made all the more startling because many of the suicide bombers are female. In summer 2003, seven suicide attacks—six of which were perpetrated by women—were carried out by Chechen extremists, with a combined death toll of 165. The attacks were not limited to the Russian military nor to targets within Chechnya; two women blew themselves up at a Moscow pop festival in July 2003, killing 16 and instilling a sense of vulnerability in the Russian population.

The desperation of these women—many of whom have lost husbands, fathers, and brothers in the recent wars in Chechnya—indicates the magnitude of the Chechens’ plight. Since Russia’s most recent invasion of Chechnya in 1999, an estimated 15,000 mujahideen guerrillas have died at the hands of Russian occupation forces, and further tens of thousands of Chechen civilians have been killed in the crossfire. Up to 300,000 Chechens fled their homes for refugee camps during the fighting, and a large portion are still displaced.

With each guerrilla attack on Russian targets, the rift widens between Russia and Chechnya. Putin’s reaction to the first suicide bombing in July 2003 gave an indication of the grim state of his recently–announced peace plan. “There is no point in trying to cure these people. They need to be dug out of the cellars and caves in which they hide and be wiped out,’’ he announced at a government meeting. And Putin has refused to deal with many prominent Chechens, including the prominent separatist and former Chechen president Aslan Maskhadov, even though many Chechens are opposed to the radical violent acts.

The intractability of the Russian authorities and the extremist ways of many Chechen separatists make it difficult to find a middle ground in Chechnya. The republic has been devastated by a decade of nearly continuous fighting. Without a real solution in sight, the fighting in Chechnya—and the accompanying terrorist activity—will likely extend far into the future.