07 January 2025

Alim Aliiev Highlights Repression Against Crimean Tatars in Occupied Crimea in Watson Interview

Ukrainian human rights advocate, Deputy Director General of the Ukrainian Institute, and co-founder of the organization CrimeaSOS, Alim Aliiev, gave an interview to the Swiss newspaper Watson, where he revealed systematic repressions by Russia against Crimean Tatars in occupied Crimea.

Aliiev compared the current situation in occupied Crimea to the historical repressions of Crimean Tatars in 1783 when Catherine II began policies to displace Indigenous peoples from Crimea. He also emphasized the 1944 genocide deportation under Joseph Stalin, where thousands of Crimean Tatars were forcibly resettled to Central Asia. His own family was deported to Uzbekistan, where he was born in 1988.

Aliiev underscored that Crimean Tatars remain the most repressed community in the temporarily occupied Crimea today. According to the human rights defender, 80% of political prisoners unlawfully detained by Russia are members of the Crimean Tatar community. These individuals have suffered fabricated accusations, arbitrary arrests, home raids, and bans on cultural and religious events. Additionally, repressive policies include kidnappings and murders aimed at isolating and gradually displacing Crimean Tatars from their historical homeland.

Meanwhile, Russia has transformed the peninsula into a base for attacks on Ukraine, with children in kindergartens and schools subjected to militarization and Russian propaganda.

Since the occupation began in 2014, Russia has resettled approximately 800,000 of its citizens to Crimea, which, according to Aliiev, is part of a deliberate strategy to alter the peninsula’s demographic composition artificially. He also highlighted that Russia is waging a targeted campaign to destroy Crimean Tatar culture and history. For instance, the Khan’s Palace in Bakhchysarai was “restored” by the occupation authorities in a way that distorted its authentic appearance. In Crimean schools, the Crimean Tatar language is offered only as a secondary subject, and the number of native speakers continues to decline.

Aliiev also drew attention to how Russian propaganda portrays Crimean Tatars as “extremists” to justify persecution:

“According to Russian propaganda, we are an extremist people. So, they do not fight against us as a people, the Crimean Tatars, but rather against terrorists. It sells better,” the advocate emphasized.

Aliiev estimates that approximately 50,000 people, predominantly Crimean Tatars, have been forced to leave Crimea due to Russian occupation. Today, they primarily reside in Kyiv, Kherson, and Lviv.

“Russia wants to destroy my people. But like Ukrainians, we fight for our identity. We always return to our homeland,” Alim Aliiev concluded.