Paul
Goble
Staunton, April 7 – Moscow officials
are asserting and some in the West are accepting the notion that local
officials in Crimea are to blame for any problems with the registration of
Crimean Tatar media outlets such as ATR television, but that is a lie in the
case of the former and a self-deception on the part of the latter, Ayder
Muzhdabayev says.
The Moscow journalist, himself a
Crimean Tatar, says the occupation authorities simply were waiting for the
Kremlin’s decision. Had that been other than to close Crimean Tatar outlets, they
would have extended ATR’s license “instantly” because this is “a routine
bureaucratic” step (nv.ua/opinion/muzhdabaev/ot-voyny-k-gibridnomu-genocidu-xxi-veka--42709.html).
Consequently, he argues, the Kremlin
and Vladimir Putin personally must be held accountable for this most unfortunate
action as well as for the fact that Moscow has begun “ethnic cleansings” in the
Ukrainian peninsula as a first step to what he calls “a hybrid genocide” of the
Crimean Tatar nation.
The entirely “intentional” Moscow
lies about what is happening in Crimea is “the latest link in a chain of lies
about the real situation of the Crimean Tatar people under the jurisdiction of
the Russian Federation and has the following goal: having hid this reality from
the world community, to continue the persecution of the Crimean Tatars in an
ever more harsh way.”
This situation threatens to take the
form of “a repetition of the worst examples of the policies of Stalin and
Hitler.” And in the near term, Muzhdabayev says, he is “certain that soon the
leaders and employees of ATR will be subjected not only to threats but to
administrative and criminal persecution with equally false accusations.”
Foreign diplomats need to recognize
that Moscow is lying to them and is moving quickly to “liquidate” the only
Crimean Tatar television and radio channels. That is bad enough, but “still
worse” is that it is becoming “a signal for the beginning of a new phase of
repressions against the Crimean Tatars,” repressions designed to force some to “’voluntarily’”
deport themselves.
The
actions if not the words of Russian
officials show that that is what they are planning and that the world must
speak out against this latest case of “ethnic cleansing,” this time against the
Crimean Tatars. And they must begin with
a recognition that “the resolution of the national question” in Crimea is the
work of Putin personally not some unknown local official.
The time to
speak out against and stop this “hybrid genocide” is now, Muzhdabayev
concludes.
The situation
is truly dire. As Halya Coynash points out, “As well as lies about the forced
silencing of Crimean Tatar TV ATR and plans to replace it with a malleable
pro-regime clone, a top figure in Russian-occupied Crimea has proposed that the
‘cult’ of May 18 – the anniversary of the Deportation of the Crimean Tatar
People in 1944 should be stopped and Crimeans should instead celebrate a ‘day
of joy’” (khpg.org/index.php?id=1428361378).
The
Ukrainian commentator cites the words of Dmitry Polonsky, the first deputy
prime minister of the occupation regime, as given to Lenta.ru. They are truly frightening in their
implications for anyone who remembers how Hitler and Stalin lied about what
they did at the time and how so many fell for their words (lenta.ru/articles/2015/04/03/krymtatary/).
According to
Polonsky, “a joint conference of all major civic Crimean Tatar organizations”
on April 2, a statement that itself is a lie because all Crimean Tatars who
oppose the occupation were excluded, “expressed
the opinion that it is long time to remove the accent from May 18. This
is undoubtedly the anniversary of a tragedy, a day of mourning, however it
should be held in memory of the dead, by going to the cemetery and remembering
the innocent victims at home.”
“The
cult of 18 May among Crimean Tatars was for decades artificially created by the
leaders of the so-called mejlis in order to give people an inferiority complex,”
Polonsky said. “ It’s impossible to build plans about the successful
development of a people on the basis of a tragedy. That, incidentally,
was the great mistake of the Ukrainian authorities that constantly tried to
create a cult out of various tragedies, whether Holodomor or the deportation. It’s impossible to build a
strong nation on failings.”
Polonsky said that the pocket Crimean
Tatar activists had proposed an alternative Crimean Tatar holiday to occur on
April 21, “the day that the President
of Russia Vladimir Putin signed a degree about the rehabilitation of victims of
the deportation …From a day of mourning we must nonetheless move to a day of
joy. … You need to remember the
dead quietly, and rejoice loudly.”
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