Since the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation, the new government has carried out systematic “repression” of Crimean Tatars according to a new report by a group of Turkish academics who visited the peninsula in April.
“After the annexation, there was a serious decline in the exercise of fundamental rights and freedoms,” says the report, published in June. “The de facto authorities pursued a systematic policy of suppression and intimidation (against Tatars).”
Most Crimean Tatars opposed the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation, and they are now suffering the consequences.
“The majority of the Crimean Tatars boycotted the referendum…. Subsequently, its members in Crimea were systematically interrogated,” says the report.
But the injustices suffered by the Tatars go beyond simple interrogations, and the delegation denounces disappearances, kidnappings, torture and killings.
“It was seen that following the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation, there has been a number of unsolved cases of killings and disappearances, some of which were observed by eye-witnesses,” claims the report.
The killing of Reşat Ametov, a Crimean Tatar, is one of the most infamous unsolved cases.
“Reşat Ametov’s killing is the most known incident in this regard because there is a video shooting of his kidnapping on March 3, 2014 and his body was found on March 16, 2014. It was reported that he was tortured and his eyes were gouged out. However, no light has yet been cast by officials on this incident,” writes the delegation.
The report also condemns the disappearance of several young Crimean Tatars.
“In addition, many young Crimean Tatars, such as İslam Cepparov and Cevdet İslamov were kidnapped in the vicinity of their homes. Although their relatives informed officials about the situation, investigations produced no results,” says the report.
Given the lack of effort that the new Crimean authorities manifest in solving these cases, and Tatars’ fears of reporting crimes, there are surely other incidents that haven’t come to light.
“In some meetings with Crimean Tatars, it was stated that incidents considered to be small-scale, such as the attacks or stabbings were not reported to the official authorities and some people are afraid of filing any complaint,” writes the delegation.
But the authorities’ inefficiency is not the only thing that the delegation condemns, and they suggest that the Self-Defense Units, which were granted official status on 11 June 2014 by the new Crimean authorities, may be directly connected to some of these killings and disappearances.
“Crimean Tatars stated that these units conduct searches, make arbitrary ID checks and use psychological and physical violence. The Self-Defense units were indicated as being responsible for deaths, losses, beatings and torture incidents,” says the report.
The report also details about other human rights violations such as raids on houses, homes and schools, arrests aimed at repression, long detention periods, pressure to give false testimonies and the authorities speaking to classes of schoolchildren without the presence of parents or teachers.
In order to justify these violations of human rights the new authorities have tried to spread hate against Tatars by linking them to extremist Muslim groups.
“The raids were justified on the grounds of eliminating radical movements and the existence of illegal publications,” explains the report.
The academics noted that they compiled their report despite constant pressure from the Russian authorities and negative news articles in local media accusing the delegation of various conspiracies.
