Dureya Ziyadova, a professor at Daghestan State University and Doctor of Law, has proposed that blood feud should no longer be considered an aggravating circumstance in murder cases. She made the proposal at a research meeting at the Criminal Law School of the Faculty of Law at Moscow State University, dedicated to the legal, criminological, and psychological aspects of blood feuds. A blood feud is a custom under which the relatives of a murder victim feel obliged to avenge their death by killing the perpetrator or one of their relatives. In the North Caucasus, the practice persists primarily in Chechnya, Ingushetia, and Daghestan. However, a blood feud can be declared not only in response to murder but also for other offences, and the conflict can sometimes involve the relatives of the alleged perpetrator. Blood feuds in the Caucasus do not always lead to immediate violence. A conflict can continue for years until the parties reach a reconciliation agreement or one side abandons its claims. Commissions tasked with reconciling feuding families operate in Ingushetia and Chechnya. Under Russian law, murder motivated by a blood feud is classified under a specific provision of the criminal code’s article on murder. It carries a prison sentence of between eight and 20 years or life imprisonment. Ziyadova proposed classifying such crimes under a different clause of the same article, which provides for a prison sentence of between six and 15 years. In her view, the current provision violates the principle of equality before the law. Opening the webinar, Ziyadova immediately spoke of the ‘significant preventive potential’ of blood feuds. She argued that, unlike ‘traditional justice’, this institution makes it possible to secure compensation for damages, an apology from the perpetrator to the victims, and their sincere repentance. In an interview with the pro-government media outlet Readovka , Ziyadova described blood feuds as a positive phenomenon and said that the fear of retaliation could deter people from committing crimes. She argued that traditional customs help keep crime rates low in Daghestan, Chechnya, and Ingushetia. However, human rights defenders attribute lower crime rates in those republics to other factors, including the large number of unreported crimes and low levels of alcohol consumption. Ziyadova herself provided no evidence of a direct link between the threat of blood feuds and crime rates in her conversation with the outlet. However, she compared the custom to ‘the Orthodox tradition of welcoming a bride with a loaf of bread’. According to Ziyadova, in some cases a community can identify the perpetrator and secure their confession and repentance without going to court. She rejected the idea that blood feuds amounted to vigilantism, arguing that the perpetrator was known to the jamaat, or local community, and that a ‘normal man’ would confess to what he had done. She posed the rhetorical question: ‘Why is a court needed?’ if the community has identified the perpetrator and they have confessed to the crime. Ziyadova also noted that if a woman committed a murder, she would not be subject to retaliation, but one of her male relatives might be. Other participants in the research meeting also spoke about the ability of blood feuds to deter crime and restore social justice. The approach was supported by Elmira Dzhakhieva, a professor at Daghestan State University, Siyabshakh Shapiev, a professor and Honoured Lawyer of Russia, and Dzhambulat Saidumov, a professor at Chechen State Pedagogical University. Continuing the discussion, Saidumov said he knew of no woman who was more protected and freer than a Chechen woman, because under the rules of blood feuds, even murder could be settled, whereas an infringement on a woman’s honour could not — except in cases involving the abduction of women for marriage. Rustem Maksudov, chair of the All-Russian Association for Restorative Mediation, meanwhile, drew attention to the similarities between traditional reconciliation and restorative justice procedures. Daghestan State University told Readovka that the university’s leadership did not share Ziyadova’s position. The university said it had forwarded information about her remarks to the rector’s office and promised to prepare an official statement. Following Ziyadova’s remarks, Eva Merkacheva, a member of the Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights, spoke out against easing the penalties. She said that including blood feud as a qualifying circumstance for murder had been necessary to put an end to the practice. She stated that murders motivated by blood feuds were now rare and described the current provision as effective. Merkacheva stressed that national customs and cultural traditions could not take precedence over federal law. According to the council’s press service, participants at the seminar where Merkacheva spoke supported her position. One of the best-known conflicts associated with blood feuds was the confrontation between the Yamadaev and Kadyrov families in Chechnya. After MP Ruslan Yamadaev was murdered in Moscow in September 2008, media outlets reported that his brother Sulim Yamadaev had declared a blood feud against Chechen Head Ramzan Kadyrov. In March 2009, Sulim Yamadaev was shot in Dubai and later died of his injuries. Dubai police, followed by another of his brothers, Isa Yamadaev, named MP Adam Delimkhanov, an ally of Kadyrov, as the organiser of the assassination attempt. Isa Yamadaev subsequently travelled to Chechnya at the request of elders to ‘reach an agreement’ with Kadyrov. However, he was later accused of plotting to assassinate Kadyrov and placed on an international wanted list. In autumn 2024, amid a dispute over the ownership of the Wildberries marketplace, Kadyrov declared a blood feud against senator Suleiman Kerimov and MPs Bekhan Barakhoev and Rizvan Kurbanov. The case of Vitaly Kaloev from North Ossetia also occupies a prominent place in the history of revenge for the deaths of loved ones. On 1 July 2002, his wife Svetlana, son Konstantin, and daughter Diana died when two aircraft collided over Lake Constance in Germany. Kaloev held Peter Nielsen, an air traffic controller employed by the Swiss company Skyguide, responsible for the disaster. In February 2004, he went to Nielsen’s home in Switzerland and stabbed him to death. In 2005, a court sentenced Kaloev to eight years in prison, finding him to have been of diminished responsibility. He was released early in November 2007 and returned to Vladikavkaz. Kaloev later served as Deputy Minister of Architecture in North Ossetia before being elected to the Vladikavkaz City Hall. He is currently a member of the republic’s parliament representing the ruling United Russia party. Kaloev’s story has been depicted in several feature films. In the American drama Aftermath (2017), his fictional counterpart was played by Arnold Schwarzenegger, while Dmitry Nagiev portrayed him in Sarik Andreasyan's Russian film Unforgiven (2018). Earlier, in 2009, the German-Swiss film Flight into the Night: The Disaster over Überlingen was released .