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Background
On October 1928, the leadership of the North Caucasus Krai failed to transfer the city of Vladikavkaz into North Ossetian ASSR because of strong objections from the Ingush Regional Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks led by Idris Zyazikov. The transfer would have brought the Ingush irreparable losses as the main industrial enterprises, a hospital, technical schools, educational institutions and many cultural institutions of Ingush Autonomous Oblast were located in Vladikavkaz. On 1 July 1933, after the removal of Zyazikov from the political scene and reprisals against other most stubborn opponents and the Ingush Regional Committee being forced to withdraw its previous objections under pressure, the leadership of the North Caucasusian Krai transferred the city of Vladikavkaz (called from 1931 Ordzhonikidze) into North Ossetian ASSR.

The Prigorodny District was part of the Chechen-Ingush ASSR. Prior to the deportation of the Chechens and Ingush, the population was mostly made up of Ingush (28132 out of 33753). In 1944, with the deportation of the Chechens and Ingush and the abolishment of their ASSR, the district was transferred to North Ossetian ASSR. Soon, on 8 May 1944, the North Ossetian Regional Committee, headed by Kubadi Kulov, replaced the toponymy in the former Chechen and Ingush raions of Chechen-Ingush ASSR. At the same time, the destruction of Chechen and Ingush cemeteries began, the tombstones from which were used for building material, and 25-35 thousand Ossetians from Georgian SSR were resettled to the Prigorodny District.

In 1957, when the Ingush were returning from the deportation and their ASSR was restored, they were denied the return to Prigorodny District which remained part of the North Ossetian ASSR. Those who tried to return to their villages faced considerable hostility. Nevertheless, during the Soviet period some Ingush managed to unofficially purchase and occupy their own houses back but they were never recognized as official residents.

During the Soviet period, programs in support of Ingush language and culture in North Ossetian ASSR were totally lacking. The policies of the ASSR limited Ingush residency in the district and hindered their access to plots of land. The internal police and local courts where Ossetians dominated treated the Ingush with prejudice, especially during the state of emergency imposed in Prigorodny in April 1992.

The constant discrimination of the Ingush forced them to organize the Rally in Grozny on 16–19 January 1973 where they demanded that the Soviet authorities solve the problem of the Prigorodny District, provide the Ingush with social equality with the Ossetians. Despite the rally being peaceful, held under the slogans of "friendship of peoples", "restoration of Leninist norms" with the order being maintained by the Ingush themselves, they received no response from the authorities and the rally ended in clashes with the police and the condemnation of its most active participants. According to Idris Bazorkin, after the protest, conditions of Ingush in the Prigorodny District improved somewhat. Ingush language appeared in schools, literature in the Ingush language arrived in the region, broadcasts in the Ingush language began on radio and television, for the first time Ingush deputies appeared in the Ordzhonikidze City Executive Committee and the Prigorodny District Executive Committee. However, much remained the same: authorities continued to limit the registration of Ingush in the district, Ingush children couldn't receive a normal education, discrimination in employment continued and Ingush were negatively portrayed in historical and fiction literature.

The tensions increased in early 1991, during the collapse of the Soviet Union, when the Ingush openly declared their rights to the Prigorodny District according to the Soviet law adopted by the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on 26 April 1991; in particular, the third and the sixth article on "territorial rehabilitation". The law gave the Ingush legal grounds for their demands, which caused serious turbulence in the region. As the tensions grew throughout 1991, Ossetian thugs harassed the Ingush and a slow exodus of refugees began into Ingushetia.

On 20 October 1992, an Ingush girl was crushed by an Ossetian armored personnel carrier and two days later Ossetian traffic police officers shot and killed two Ingush. After the series of murders of Ingush citizens in the district, Ingush deputies requested on 23–24 October the Supreme Soviet of Russia and its government to send a special commission to the Ossetian-Ingush border zone in order to prevent the impending conflict, but no action was taken. On 24 October the leaders of the Prigorodny District gathered in the village of Yuzhny where they called on all local village councils to declare secession from North Ossetia and entry into Ingushetia in accordance with the law of Russia. In addition, an attempt was made to create Ingush self-defense units. At the end of October, things came to an armed confrontation, with the Ossetian side relying on the support of the Russian army.

Armed confrontation
By the start of the armed confrontation, both Ossetians and Ingush were armed. However, the Ingush were outgunned by the Ossetians who had a much superior military force including armored personnel carriers and tanks. The Ossetian side was supported by the Russia who provided all the material and political conditions for executing mass violence against the Ingush.

On 31 October, a number of Ingush villages were shelled. As a response, on the next day, the Ingush drove out the Ossetian police from the village of Chermen (village), captured weapons and rampaged through Ossetian areas. On the same day, Bembulat Bogatyrev organized an Emergency Committee which ultimately saved the lives of many Ingush people who were evacuated from the combat zone in time. On 2 November, Boris Yeltsin declared a state of emergency in North Ossetia and Ingushetia and ordered 3,000 Russian Interior Ministry soldiers and paratrooper units to intervene. They failed to accomplish their main mission, that is, separation of the conflicting parties. Instead, they blocked off the Ossetian-Ingush border and even marched towards the border with Chechnya. The Prigorodny District fell under total control of the Ossetian paramilitary formations, including South Ossetian detachments. It had been concluded by journalists like Irina Dementieva and Yegor Gaidar that the real target of the army was Chechnya.

Sebastian Smith notes: "The actual fighting was so one-sided that it was more a pogrom than battle. First the villages came under artillery fire, while helicopters either fired or directed fire. Then the settlements were attacked by troops equipped with armoured personnel carriers and no Ingush was safe. Many Ingush houses were set ablaze by arsonists, not as a result of fighting."

The conflict ended in ethnic cleansing of the Ingush who fled from the combat zone en masse. Officially, about 65,000 registered refugees fled from North Ossetia into Ingushetia; 419 Ingush, 171 Ossetians and 60 others were killed. Unofficial figures gave death tolls as high as 750 and 500 wounded. About 1,000 people were taken hostage by both sides. 3,000 Ingush houses were burned. Three apartment buildings in the village of Dachnoie were occupied by South Ossetians, some 800 apartments of Ingush who had been expelled from Vladikavkaz were occupied by Ossetian police whole were directly involved in the ethnic cleansing.