AS LOST causes go, that of the Circassians is especially sad. Having fled their homeland on the north-east of the Black sea in the 19th century as imperial Russia expanded south, 90% of them (estimates range from 5m to 8m) are in exile. They gathered in 40-odd countries on May 21st, marking the massacres of, they say, a million or more in 1864.

The rallies marked a new high point after decades in which the cause smouldered in a scattered diaspora. “For so long we limited ourselves to keeping alive our dance and language,” says Tamara Barsik, a 29-year-old Circassian-American from New Jersey. “But the internet has let us read about Circassia. We are now working to develop a national identity.” She and her colleagues study closely the tactics of other émigrés who strive for far-flung causes, including Armenian, Estonian and Jewish groups.

One aim is to win recognition for their past suffering. Activists are incensed by the choice of Sochi for the 2014 Winter Olympics. Now a Russian seaside resort, it was once the Circassian capital, and the site of events all but forgotten in modern Russia. “We want the athletes to know that if they compete here they will be skiing on the bones of our relatives,” says Iyad Youghar, who heads the International Circassian Council, a lobby group. America gives a bit of support to the Circassians, broadcasting in one of the two main languages. The Georgian parliament, keen to annoy Russia, has officially termed the massacres “genocide”.

Such moves help stoke suspicion in Russia that the Circassian cause is a Western plot. The remaining Circassians there are spread across three republics in the troubled North Caucasus. Though not beset by the violence of nearby Chechnya, the local authorities have kept a tight grip. “I didn't feel free or comfortable there,” says Sataney Chigun, a Jordanian-Circassian journalist who moved to the region as a child, but left in 2010.

Yet Russia has its attractions too—especially for the 100,000-odd Circassians caught in Syria's strife. Russian parliamentarians examined their plight in March; 25 families moved back in May. But Russia, twitchy about Muslims, wary of the Circassians' friends, and a staunch ally of the Damascus regime, has yet to decide whether to admit any more.