06 August 2024

Russians Illegally Deported Crimean Tatar Political Prisoner Remzi Bekirov Five Thousand Kilometers Away from Crimea

It has become known where the Crimean civilian journalist and activist Remzi Bekirov is finally being transferred to. The political prisoner was taken out of the detention center in Krasnoyarsk, Russia, and is currently being transported to penal colony № 33, located in the capital of the Republic of Khakassia — the city of Abakan, Russia, more than five thousand kilometers away from Crimea. The man said this in a letter to his wife Khalida Bekirova.

According to Ramzi, he is still being held at an intermediate point — in pre-trial detention center № 2 in Abakan, Russia. The man was transported in a special railroad train with iron bars and small cells with narrow benches. Such trains often lack ventilation, light, and sanitary conditions are characterized as unsatisfactory. Bekirov will stay in the pre-trial detention center for three to six days, the guards told him. Then he will be sent to penal colony № 33.

“This is a regime prison camp with its own specifics. Apparently, the Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia does not want to send me closer to home in Crimea,” the Crimean Tatar wrote in a letter.

Last month, the political prisoner was taken out of prison №2 in Yeniseisk, Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia. Earlier, the occupiers refused to transfer Remzi Bekirov to a colony closer to home.

Remzi Bekirov was detained when one of the most massive searches of Crimean Tatars took place in occupied Crimea on March 27, 2019, during which 20 people were detained and illegally charged with alleged “terrorism.” In the following days, five more Crimean Tatars were detained and charged in the so-called “Crimean Muslim case.” Remzi Bekirov was among them.