Qarşılıq / Resistance: Isa Akaiev

Qarşılıq / Resistance is a series of stories of representatives of the indigenous peoples of Ukraine, military and veterans, who fought and continue to fight for the right to live in a free and independent Ukrainian state. 

On the occasion of the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of the Crimean Tatar Genocide, five Ukrainian servicemen and veterans of Crimean Tatar origin will speak about their motivation to take up arms against the Russian occupiers. Each hero’s family was deported by the Soviet authorities in 1944, experienced many hardships, and still managed to return to their homeland. Unfortunately, the Russian occupiers deprived the descendants of those criminally deported 80 years ago of the opportunity to live in their native Crimea. 

Today, Isa Akaiev, commander of the volunteer battalion “Crimea” of the Defence Intelligence of the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine, tells his story:

“I was born in Uzbekistan. I was in exile.

I spent my childhood in an area where Russians deported not only Crimean Tatars, but also Koreans, Germans, Poles, Czechs, and dekulakized Ukrainians. Growing up, I saw with my own eyes what Russia was doing to other nations. 

My grandmother always used to say that we must return to Crimea because it is our home. “If we do not return there, we will simply disappear. Remember that a people without land disappears. The strength of a people comes from the land,” my grandmother told me. 

Although I was born and raised in exile, I always remembered where my real home was and where I came from. I remembered that before the deportation my father’s family lived in the village of Mamashai, which the Russians renamed Orlovka. I knew that my mother was a native of Nogai and that her family came from the village of Aksheikh, although the Russians called it Rozdolne. 

I want Crimea to be the same as my ancestors knew it. I want the Crimean Tatar language to be heard there and our culture to flourish. I want to do everything in my power to make Crimea a center of development, not a center of decline, as the Russians have made it. 

This is what I am fighting for. 

Because we have been nurtured by this land. We are children of this land. 

And that is why we will definitely liberate Crimea from the occupiers. That is why we will definitely return home”. 

Isa Akaiev, a Ukrainian soldier of Crimean Tatar origin, is working with Ukrainians and other indigenous peoples of Ukraine to bring the liberation of Crimea closer. He is fighting for freedom and continues to resist the occupiers in order to live in a free and strong Ukrainian state and to prevent his own and his family’s history from repeating itself.