Ukraine is convinced that the time will come when all its indigenous peoples will gain complete freedom, after Russia withdraws its troops from the temporarily occupied territories, and justice will be restored. This is stated in the statement of the Ukrainian delegation at the UN meeting, which was announced by the advisor of the Permanent Mission of Ukraine to the UN Natalia Mudrenko during the general debate on the rights of indigenous peoples in the Third Committee of the General Assembly.
Mudrenko noted that the Russian occupation of the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, including Crimea, is accompanied by arbitrary detentions, incommunicado detention, persecution, torture, intimidation, and enforced disappearances.
In addition, the adviser emphasized that coercive measures are ongoing in Crimea, including the forced granting of Russian citizenship, resettlement, deportation of the population, as well as conscription into the Russian army. Since the beginning of the occupation, the Russian regime has severely limited the Crimean Tatar identity, trying to subjugate the leaders and organizations of the Crimean Tatar community.
Mudrenko also drew attention to the fact that the Mejlis, the representative body of the Crimean Tatars, has been banned as an “extremist organization” since September 2016. She recalled that on January 31 of this year, the UN International Court of Justice recognized that Russia, by banning the activities of the Mejlis, violated the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, limiting the right of the Crimean Tatars to support their institutions.
Well-known Crimean Tatar leaders Mustafa Dzhemilev and Refat Chubarov are still banned from entering Crimea, which, according to Mudrenko, is an echo of the deportation of the Crimean Tatar people in 1944. Both leaders were convicted in absentia by the Russian authorities.
According to Mudrenko, Crimea today has turned into a huge prison that hides numerous crimes of Russia. Currently, more than 280 citizens of Ukraine are illegally detained and persecuted on fabricated charges of terrorism and extremism, 212 of them are Crimean Tatars.
