On May 18, 1944, Joseph Stalin deported 218,000 Crimean Tatars to Central Asia.Using personal testimonies, this film tells the story of the Tatars' expulsion from their homeland and their long struggle to return. It was only in 1989, with the opening up of the Soviet Union, that they were able to come back in large numbers. Most, finding Russians living in their former homes, built shacks in which to live.Today, 300,000 Tatars live in Crimea - 5,000 of them still in shacks. Even those with houses suffer because they only have minority status. Despite this, 150,000 more are still hoping to return home.
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Ukraine crisis:
For one who is likely to be among the first to be taken away at gunpoint if the new men in power here have their way, Fazil Amazayev, was being remarkably calm. Such actions, he insisted “will unite all the Muslims here; they will make enemies of us all”.
Mr Amazayev is a senior member of Hizb ut-Tahrir, the Islamic political organisation which is legal in Ukraine. However, among the first pronouncements made by the new separatist Prime Minister of Crimea and the security chief he has appointed is that it is a “dangerous terrorist organisation” which will have to be dealt with.
Hizb ut-Tahrir has been blamed in many countries for promoting radicalism; but violent militancy caused by it is hard to find in Ukraine. And the fear of becoming sectarian targets is not just confined to activists among the Tatars: many in the community are staying away from city centres where Russian-speaking vigilantes hold sway, and some are leaving for other parts of the country.
Percentage of Crimean Tatars by region in Crimea according to 2001 Ukrainian census
Mr Amazayev says he is confident that the Tatars of Crimea will not let him and others from his group be picked off by the new head of security, Petr Zima, who was promoted from his previous post in Sevastopol, the home of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. “Zima built up a reputation in Sevastopol for carrying out raids, accusing people of being involved in extremism. But, if he starts doing that now, he will make a big mistake. The people in the [Tatar] establishment, the Mufti and the Mejlis [representative council] criticised us in the past, but now we are all facing the common enemy. And, if they do start persecuting us, we know how to survive, we have done it in Syria, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia.”
Nevertheless, Mr Amazayev has started to be very cautious, not straying outside his home town, Bakhchisarai, a historic place of mosques where Muslims form a sizeable portion of the population. “I don’t think it will be safe for me to travel, not at this time,” he said.
The larger Tatar community is in friction with the Russian nationalist population over the issue of secession from Ukraine. The new Crimean administration of Sergei Aksenov is organising a referendum on the issue, clearing the way to rule by Moscow – anathema to the Tatars who were deported from here, en masse, to Siberia and the central Asian steppes by Stalin at the end of the Second World War.
Today the head of the Russian republic of Tatarstan arrived in Crimea. Many, however, view Rustam Minnikhanov as an emissary of the Kremlin sent to persuade the Mejlis to change its policy of refusing to recognise the new separatist Crimean administration. “He is not someone we see as our protector,” said one of its officials.
The sense of being under threat has led to the formation of self-defence groups in Tatar neighbourhoods: the growing prevalence of fear in a people who have lived, on the whole, amicably with those of Russian and Ukrainian extraction since they returned from exile in the 1990s.
The current tensions emerged quickly. A demonstration against secession drew 10,000 from Ukraine’s largest Muslim community to the streets of the Crimean capital, Simferopol, last week. There were chants of “Allah hu Akhbar” from a small band of Tatars which some among an opposing protest by Russian speakers complained they found intimidating.
There were no serious acts of violence by either side or the police; but two people were reported to have died in the crush as the crowd converged outside the state parliament.
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That night the parliament buildings were taken over by Russian-speaking gunmen in balaclavas. The following morning Vladimir Putin’s forces had begun taking over strategic locations. Soon the actual numbers of those killed in the rally rose to four or six. All the victims were, it was claimed, Russians who had been murdered by Tatars using iron bars, knives and noxious sprays.
Street collections were soon under way for the bereaved families, and passing Tatars often found themselves subjected to abuse. Adem Suleymanov was hurrying home in the evening through Simferopol’s Lenin Square when he was accosted by three young men wearing orange and black ribbons of the Russian military order of St George.
“They were quite drunk. They demanded that I should give money for the families of those who died. I did,” he recalled. “Then one of them swung me around and started shouting ‘Why do you want to destroy that?’ And then he started kicking at me.” Mr Suleymanov was being pointed by his attackers at the statue of Lenin which the Mejlis had demanded should be pulled down and replaced by a park reflecting peace and unity among the different nationalities of Crimea.
A “march for peace” was held at Bakhchisarai by the League of Crimean Tatar Women. It walked past Russian nationalist vigilantes who had formed a cordon in front of a Ukrainian base surrounded by Moscow’s forces. “I do not like foreign soldiers occupying our country,” said 25-year-old Aliya. “I also do not agree with the policies of Hizb ut-Tahrir. If the Russians start pressuring the Tatars then it is natural that people will close in and, who knows, people like Hizb ut-Tahrir may start picking up support.”
Sitting on his balcony, watching the march and the Russian soldiers, 75-year-old Rifat Ibrahimov’s one wish was that the past not return: “I was so very young when we were moved from here that time. I have learnt to forget most of the terrible things that happened, especially after we came back home. No, I do not want to see days like those again.”
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Crimean Khanate
Crimean Tatars (Qırım, Qırımlı) are a Turkic ethnic group, and formerly during the Crimean Khanate a Turco-Mongol ethnic group, native to the Crimea (a peninsula on the northern part of the Black Sea) in modern-day Ukraine. They are a subgroup of the Tatars. Crimean Tatars speak Crimean Tatar,Russian or Turkish, depending on locale, and increasingly Ukrainian, as it is mostly the language of education. For example, in Crimea, they use Russian in public and/or with non-Tatars, while Turkey's population of Crimean Tatar ancestry primarily uses Turkish.
In modern times, in addition to living in Ukraine, there is a large diaspora of Crimean Tatars in Turkey,Uzbekistan, Romania, Bulgaria, Western Europe, the Middle East and North America, as well as small communities in Finland, Lithuania, Russia, Belarus and Poland.
The Crimean Tatars emerged as a nation at the time of the Crimean Khanate. The Crimean Khanate was a Turkic-speaking Muslim state which was among the strongest powers in Eastern Europe until the beginning of the 18th century. The nobles and rulers of the Crimean Tatars were the progeny of Hacı I Girai a Jochid descendant of Genghis Khan who was Great Mongol ruler, and thus of Batu Khan of the Mongol Golden Horde. The Crimean Tatars mostly adopted Islam in the 14th century and thereafter Crimea became one of the centers of Islamic civilization. This was signified by Ozbeg Khan erecting the first mosque and medrese in Eski Qırım in 1314.
According to Baron Iosif Igelström, in 1783 there were close to 1600 mosques and religious schools in Crimea. In Bakhchisaray, the khan Meñli I Giray built Zıncırlı Medrese (literally "Chain Madrassah"), an Islamic seminary where one has to bow while entering from its door because of the chain hanging over. This symbolized the Crimean society's respect for learning. Meñli I Giray also constructed a large mosque on the model of Hagia Sophia (which was ruined in 1850s). Later, the khans built a greater palace, Hansaray in Bakhchisaray, which survives to this day. Sahib I Giray patronized many scholars and artists in this palace. During the reign of Devlet I Giray the architect Mimar Sinan built a mosque, Juma-Jami, in Yevpatoria. The Crimean Khanate became aprotectorate of the Ottoman Empire in 1475, when the Ottoman general Gedik Ahmed Pasha conquered the southern coast of Crimea. The alliance with the Ottomans became an important factor in the survival of the khanate until the 18th century.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimean_Tatars
Кримські татари - Crimean Tatars of Ukraine - Qırımtatarlar - YouTube
www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRDuuJApsiQ
Sep 7, 2012 - Uploaded by ZakhariiCrimean Tatars of Ukraine. ... Кримські Татари, корінне населення Криму. В Україні живе 260.000 Кримських Татар. Crimean Tatars are native ...
Crimean Tatars. Back from USSR | Maupictures. Multimédia agency.
maupictures.com/photostory/crimean-tatarsMore than 250000 Crimean Tatars have returned to their homeland, struggling to ... ofCrimean Tatar religious ...
Crimean tensions spill over into clashes between Crimean Tatars and pro-Russian supporters - YouTube
www.youtube.com/watch?v=moGcxPyiNsc7 days ago - Uploaded by WorldNewSUkraines Crimean Tatars came out emphatically to support the new ... bar tenders not to serve gay customers ...- www.canstockphoto.com/wedding-of-crimean-tatars-i...Oct 21, 2011Wedding of Crimean Tatars in Mosque Stock Footage. 7593775 - Imam (islamic priest) preaching at the ...
- www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mQAHRcNR3A
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The Tatars by adjua dashield on Prezi
prezi.com/lf_lsfq5wfci/the-tatars/Oct 31, 2013Religion Most Tatars are Sunni Muslims, except the Kryashan Tatars, ... In 1944, the Crimean Tatars were ...
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Tatars claim property rights on Crimean Peninsula - YouTube
www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QLjFOkxESASep 4, 2013 - Uploaded by Kevin KTatars claim property rights on CrimeanPeninsula. Kevin K·2,154 videos ... Tatarstan model for religious ...- www.canstockphoto.com/islamic-wedding-ceremony-...Oct 21, 2011Islamic wedding ceremony Stock Footage. 7593592 - Crimean Tatar young couple at a wedding ceremony ...
