Paul
Goble
Staunton, October 4 – Since the
Anschluss, 18 Crimean Tatars have “disappeared,” three of them in the last week
alone, Crimean Tatar leader Mustafa Cemilev told a meeting of the Parliamentary
Assembly of the Council of Europe yesterday, a reflection of increasing
oppression and growing illegality by the Russian occupiers.
Two youths, Isyam Dzhepparov and
Dzhevdet Islyamov disappeared on September 27 fromteh village of Sary-Su in the
Belgorod district, and a third Edem Asanov disappeared on his way to work in
Yevpatoriya (qha.com.ua/za-6-mesyatsev-v-krimu-bez-vesti-propalo-18-krimskih-tatar-djemilev-140295.html).
This wave of disappearances, only
one of which has been solved by the discovery of a body, is only part of the
oppression that the occupation authorities are inflicting on the Crimean
Tatars, Cemilev said. Also in the course
of the last week, Russian siloviki conducted 40 searches in Crimean Tatar homes
and institutions.
In some but not all cases, the
Russian police have opened criminal cases and gone through the motions at least
of conducting a search, but their lack of progress has provoked suspicions that
the authorities themselves are involved in the disappearances of the Crimean
Tatars.
Those suspicions have grown so
strong that Sergey Aksyonov, who is the acting head of the Russian occupation, announced
that he was creating a special “contact group” attached to the Council of
Ministers of the Republic of Crimea to deal with “the affairs of missing
Crimean Tatars” (qha.com.ua/po-faktu-propaji-edema-asanova-zaveli-ugolovnoe-delo-140305.html).
But that announcement only underscores the extent of the
problem and the failure of the authorities to respond to it in any meaningful
way. And it will certainly increase the
number of Crimean Tatars who accept Cemilev’s earlier argument that Russia
wants a Crimea without Crimean Tatars.
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