Introduction

The dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 was accompanied by the demise of the system of state–Muslim relations which had persisted, albeit with modifications, since 1788. The four state-controlled regional muftīates were superseded by a plethora of new muftīates, which were created along ethnonational and regional lines. New muftīates were headed by so-called ‘young imāms’ who politically distanced themselves from their Soviet-era predecessors and competed for the right to represent particular Muslim communities at regional, national and international levels. In the western part of the ex-USSR, where Muslims historically constituted a minority that used to be within the domain of the Ufa-based Spiritual Directorate of Muslims of the European Part of the USSR and Siberia (DUMES), there appeared independent muftīates which lacked historical precedence and which were headed by muftīs recruited both internally and from abroad. At the same time, there emerged various alternative Muslim organizations that negated the muftīate model and affiliated themselves with pan-European, or transnational Islamic structures or movements. In terms of doctrinal orientation, they largely opposed national Islamic traditions and adhered to Salafī Islam. The Islamic dynamic in ex-Soviet Belarus, Ukraine and Lithuania, all three of which have sizeable Tatardominated Muslim minorities, has also been affected by these countries’ frontier location between Russia-centred political and cultural Eurasianism and European Union (EU)-driven Europeanism. A particular case in point has been independent Lithuania which, alongside neighbouring Latvia and Estonia, joined the implicitly anti-Russian EU and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

This chapter examines how the differing political models and external engagements of Belarus, Ukraine and Lithuania have affected state–Muslim relations and Muslims themselves, and the doctrinal orientation and politics of Muslim leadership in these post-Soviet states, which had previously lacked independent Islamic structures. It begins by providing a brief historical background for these countries which were not specifically discussed in Parts I and II. It pays special attention to the implications of the Second World War for the Belorussian, Lithuanian and Ukrainian societies and Muslims, and their leaders in particular.