The fight against pan-Islamism on the territory of Ukraine at the beginning of the 20th century (based on the materials from the Central State Historical Archives of Ukraine in Kyiv)

The article examines the main most significant circulars of the Police Department and the Department of Spiritual Affairs of Foreign Denominations on the “Muslim Question and Counteraction to Pan-Islamism,” as well as correspondence between heads of provincial, county, and district police departments, and other officials on the territory of Ukraine at the beginning of the 20th century, preserved in the files of the Central State Historical Archive of Ukraine in Kyiv. The documents date from 1910–1916 and are generally contained in the collections of the Kyiv Gendarmerie Administration, the Odesa Gendarmerie Administration, the Katerynoslav Provincial Gendarmerie Administration, the Office of the Kyiv, Podolia, and Volynia Governor-General, etc. The analysis of these materials demonstrates the increased attention of the branches of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Empire to the Muslim population, which was associated with the activation of the Muslim movement at the beginning of the 20th century. “Pan-Islamism” was considered any activity among Muslims, including in the Ukrainian territory, where, according to the government, the proximity of Muslims to Crimea and Turkey posed a threat to political and social stability. It was found that the structures of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, carrying out painstaking professional work of collecting and analyzing information to obtain a realistic picture of the processes taking place in the Muslim environment, generally possessed a sufficiently objective analysis of the Muslim movement in the region and on the territory of Ukraine, which allowed them to implement effective countermeasures. A meaningful analysis of the circular instructions provides an understanding of the dynamics of changes in the government’s perception of the processes within the Muslim movement and the adjustment of methods of combating it. The establishment of total surveillance of the Muslim population, and the creation of a network of agents and informants not only in places of their compact residence in the Crimea, the Volga-Ural region, etc., but also on the territory of Ukraine, in Kyiv, yielded results. Owing to the gendarmerie’s surveillance of Muslims in Kyiv, in the fight against pan-Islamism, the activities of the organization preparing to hold a secret congress of Muslim youth of the Russian Empire were revealed.