Russian imperialism threatens Crimean Tatars

Submitted by cathy n on 19 May, 2014 - 9:17

Sunday 18 May marked the 70th anniversary of Stalin’s deportation of the Crimean Tatars. But the new Russian authorities in Crimea systematically undermined attempts to commemorate the anniversary.

Beginning in the night of 17/18 May 1944 the entire Crimean Tatar population was deported and scattered across Soviet Central Asia, Kazakhstan and the Urals. Some 100,000 Tatars – 40% of the population – died during the deportation and the first year of ‘resettlement’.

After decades of campaigning, Crimean Tatars were allowed to return to their homeland in the dying days of the Soviet Union. But in March of this year – after a pseudo-referendum staged in conditions of Russian military occupation – Crimea was annexed by Russia.

The Tatar Medzhlis (National Council) had dismissed the referendum as “a performance by clowns, a circus being staged in the shadow of armed soldiers” and had called on Tatars and “their neighbours of different nationalities” to boycott the fake referendum.

According to Medzhlis president Refat Chubarov, no more than a thousand of the Crimea’s 185,000 Tatar voters participated in the referendum. (The Crimean Tatars live in compact communities, which facilitated monitoring the level of participation.)

In mid-April the Presidium of the Medzhlis issued a statement, “On the Escalating Lawlessness in Crimea”, listing a number of physical attacks (including one murder), acts of vandalism, and cases of media censorship directed at the peninsula’s Tatars which had occurred since the Russian annexation.

Around the same time, the new Crimean authorities banned Tatar leader Mustafa Dzhemilev from the territory of the Russian Federation (which now included the Crimea) until 2019, and unilaterally announced that a “new format” would be adopted to mark this year’s commemoration of the 1944 deportation.

The Medzhlis responded: “We did not return to our homeland so that people who change their political affiliations several times a day could tell Crimean Tatars, who possess their own ancient culture, in what format and in what capacity they should participate (in the commemoration).”

Ironically, mid-April also saw Russian President Vladimir Putin sign a decree officially “rehabilitating” the Crimean Tatars and other ethnic minorities on the peninsula who had been victims of the 1944 deportation.

But, said Putin, this “rehabilitation” was “part of Crimea’s integration into Russia.” He “understood” that “there are people who have done a lot for the Crimean Tatars … but what we all need to realize is that the interests of the Crimean Tatars today are bound to Russia.”

Dzhemilev dismissed the decree as an attempt by the Russian government to “ingratiate itself” with the Crimean Tatars and refused to recognise its authority.

In response, the Crimean Governor (and local mafia boss) Sergey Aksyonov accused Dzhemilev of being “on the payroll of Western secret services” and of carrying out “provocations” aimed at hindering the “peaceful integration” of the peninsula’s Tatars into Russia.

In early May Chubarov organized a car-convoy of 1,500 Crimean Tatars to travel to the Turyetsky Val checkpoint between Crimea and Ukraine. For five hours they occupied the checkpoint in protest at the entry ban imposed on Dzhemilev while simultaneously staging a rally with the latter on the Ukrainian side of the border.

The next day the Russian-Crimean authorities issued Chubarov with a formal “Warning About Impermissible Extremist Activities”: a repeat of any such activities would result in “the liquidation of the Medzhlis of the Crimean-Tatar People and the banning of its activities on the territory of the Russian Federation.”

“Emissaries” from the Russian Federation’s predominantly Muslim republics of Tatarstan, Bashkiria and Chechnya have also arrived in Crimea in increasing numbers and attempted to persuade Tatars to adopt Russian citizenship.

These efforts at persuasion have been backed up by threats that Tatars risk losing their jobs or seeing their business closed down if they fail to adopt Russian citizenship. In fact, even before the Russian annexation, Tatars accounted for just 3% of public sector jobs, although they make up 14% of the Crimean population.

A report published by the UN Human Rights Commissioner in mid-May found:

“… Crimean Tatars are facing numerous other problems: these include the freedom of movement of their leaders; cases of physical harassment; restrictions on Crimean Tatar media; fears of religious persecution of those who are practising Muslims.”

Estimates of the number of Tatars who have fled the Crimea since Russia’s annexation – with the majority fleeing to western Ukraine – vary from 5,000 to 7,000. Poland has also granted refugee status to around 30 Crimean Tatars.

On 16 May the authorities announced that no mass meetings would be allowed on 18th May, and that all mass meetings were banned until 6th June (hardly by coincidence, the day of an annual Russian festival in Crimea).

Although such mass meetings had been staged since 1991 (when 18th May first became an official Day of Remembrance) the authorities stated that events in the south-east of Ukraine meant that mass meetings might result in disorder or “provocations” which would disrupt the resort’s holiday season.

The authorities also banned any display of the Ukrainian flag at events being held on Remembrance Day, but tried to insist, rather unrealistically, that participants should be allowed to display Russian flags at the day’s events (as that was now the national flag of Crimea).

The announcement came in the wake of raids by the Russian Federal Security Service on the homes of a number of Tatar activists, who were allegedly suspected of “terrorist activity”.

A meeting of the Medzhlis on 17th May voted to defy the ban and stage the main commemoration event in the centre of Simferopol as usual. But that decision was subsequently abandoned and participants were urged instead to attend a rally on the outskirts of the city.

In order to minimize the numbers participating in the commemoration, police put up roadblocks around Simferopol from early morning on 18th May onwards. Russian riot police and so-called “self-defence” squads also blocked off access to the city centre.

Tatars resident in Simferopol, and those who managed to get through the police checks, were directed by police to the rally outside a mosque on the city’s outskirts. While Russian military helicopters circled overhead and drowned out speakers, between 15,000 and 20,000 attended the rally, compared with the normal figure of up to 40,000.

For obvious reasons, the Day of Remembrance is the most important day in the Crimean Tatar calendar. The bans and obstacles which the Russian-Crimean authorities used to hinder its commemoration underline the oppressive nature of Russian imperialism’s occupation of Crimea.

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