49 people were taken to Crimean police stations for holding unauthorized single pickets. Interfax reports this with reference to the press service of the Republic's Ministry of Internal Affairs.
As the agency was told by the department, the participants in the unauthorized pickets were released from the premises of the police department after conducting “preventive conversations.” The police are conducting an investigation to identify the organizers of the protest.
As users of social networks write, pickets were held in different parts of Crimea on October 14 against the actions of local authorities towards the Crimean Tatars. In particular, the picketers protested against the arrests of Crimean Tatars associated with groups banned in Russia. They showed posters with the inscriptions “Crimean Tatars are not extremists”, “My people are not terrorists” and others.
On October 11, the FSB announced the suppression of the activities of a cell of the Hizb ut-Tahrir organization banned in Russia in Bakhchisarai. Criminal cases were initiated against six members of the Bakhchisarai cell under Art. Part 1–2 tbsp. 205.5 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (organizing the activities of a terrorist organization and participating in the activities of such an organization).
The Zheleznodorozhny District Court of Simferopol fined 10 thousand rubles and also arrested 76-year-old pensioner Server Karametov for 10 days for a single picket in support of the Deputy Chairman of the Mejlis (banned in Russia) Akhtem Chiygoz.
Karametov held a single picket with a poster near the Supreme Court of Crimea. The pensioner was detained by the police. Later, two administrative protocols were drawn up against him - for violating the procedure for holding a public event and disobeying a police officer.
According to Semedlyaev, Karametov “has severely impaired motor skills, he also has glaucoma, and urgent eye surgery is scheduled.”
One of the leaders of the organization “Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People”, Akhtem Chiygoz, was detained on suspicion of participating in and organizing mass riots near the building of the Crimean Rada at a rally on February 26, 2014. Then two people died and 79 were injured. The prosecutor's office demanded that Chiygoz be sentenced to 8 years in prison. His final verdict will be handed down on September 11.
About 100 single pickets were held by Crimean Tatars along Crimean highways on Saturday afternoon. The protesters held banners in their hands calling to “stop repression” against Crimean Tatars and Muslims. The Crimean police detained 49 picketers and released them after preventive conversations. The department reported that they were looking for the organizer of the action. Vice Speaker of the State Council of Crimea Remzi Ilyasov says that “unscrupulous politicians” are trying to use the arrests of radicals and terrorists to reproach the authorities.
In total, according to Kommersant's information, about 100 people went to single pickets on October 14. Only men took part in the action. In their hands they held posters calling on security forces and the Crimean authorities to “stop repression” against Crimean Tatars and Muslims. Single pickets were held along the main Crimean highways: in Bakhchisarai, Simferopol, Belogorsk, Krasnogvardeisky, Dzhankoy and Kirov regions. One of the picketers told Kommersant that he came to the rally to express his “disagreement with the actions of the authorities.” He considers illegal the “mass arrests” of Crimean Tatars, including members of the Hizb ut-Tahrir organization (which calls its goal the creation of a “worldwide Islamic caliphate”; it was declared terrorist in the Russian Federation in 2003). “They didn’t prepare terrorist attacks, they didn’t do anything. They were just members of the organization,” a picket participant told Kommersant.
Over the past two weeks in Crimea, FSB and police officers suppressed the activities of two cells of extremist organizations. On October 2, four members of Tablighi Jamaat were detained in the Simferopol and Belogorsky districts. The Supreme Court of the Russian Federation declared this organization extremist in 2009 for activities that “threaten interethnic and interfaith stability in Russian society and the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation.” On October 11, six members of Hizb ut-Tahrir were detained in Bakhchisaray.
Crimean Tatar activist Zair Smedlyaev told Kommersant that the reason for the mass single pickets in Crimea was a protest “against the arbitrariness of the security forces.” “They detain and arrest Crimean Tatars and Muslims, without having an evidence base, rudely breaking into houses where there are small children. These are acts of intimidation,” says Zair Smedlyaev. In total, according to his data, about 30 Crimean Tatars were arrested for participation in Hizb ut-Tahrir and Tablighi Jamaat over three and a half years in Crimea.
The press service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Crimea reported the suppression of uncoordinated pickets on the peninsula and the detention of 49 protesters for violating the requirements of the law “On meetings, rallies, demonstrations, processions and pickets.” “After receiving explanations from them and conducting preventive conversations, all participants in the events were released from the premises of the police department,” the Ministry of Internal Affairs said in a statement. The police also said that they are looking for those responsible for organizing the protest to bring them to justice.
Vice Speaker of the State Council of Crimea Remzi Ilyasov told Kommersant that “unscrupulous politicians” are trying to use the detentions and arrests of radicals in Crimea to “reproach the current government.” “Although all this (detention and arrests.- “Kommersant”) is associated with people who are adherents of radical Islam and terrorist organizations. The majority of Crimean Tatars adhere to traditional Islam and do not welcome sects,” said Remzi Ilyasov. He recalled that in Ukraine, where the activities of Hizb ut-Tahrir are allowed (until the spring of 2014, according to various estimates, this organization had up to 15 thousand members in Crimea), the Crimean Tatars and their leaders sought to ban this organization until 2014 .
Vadim Nikiforov, Simferopol
Activists demanded that the occupiers respect the rights of the Crimean Tatar people.
Crimean courts throughout the peninsula sat all day on December 18, measuring in monetary terms 76 single pickets - the same number of hearings on administrative charges of an “unauthorized mass event” that were supposed to take place on Monday. The authorities of the peninsula annexed by Russia want to punish those who took to the streets to protest against the mass arrests and abductions of Crimean Tatars, reports svoboda.org.
The trials, which could result in a fine of up to 20 thousand rubles for each participant in the pickets, took place in Simferopol, Dzhankoy, Alushta, Belogorsk, Krasnogardeysk, Sovetsky and Sudak. Among the accused are only Crimean Tatars. Crimean Tatar activists even draw parallels on social networks with the date of the deportation of the people from Crimea - May 18, 1944, and joke that sanctions for the annexation of the peninsula have so depleted the Russian budget that the authorities are trying to cover the costs by fining the Crimean Tatars. No one in Crimea doubts that there will not be a single acquittal.
By Monday evening, more than 50 activists were fined 10 thousand rubles each, one person - 15 thousand rubles, several trials were postponed to other dates.
“It’s difficult to understand the logic of the people who came up with this mass trial,” notes a human rights activist from Dzhankoy Lutfiye Zudieva. – Pour huge amounts of money into the construction of mosques, the creation of a pro-government Crimean Tatar TV channel, into the organization of mass events in order to prove to everyone how many rights the Crimean Tatars have in Crimea. And then immediately demonstrate the opposite - why the security forces needed all this, I still don’t understand. If they had ignored these pickets, there would have been much less information noise, and the picture of the Crimean Tatars, “happy as part of the Russian Federation,” would have sparkled with new colors. But they apparently decided to act as standard."
In early October, Russian security forces carried out a special operation in Bakhchisaray, as a result of which six Crimean Tatars were arrested, accused of participating in the Islamic organization Hizb ut-Tahrir, recognized as terrorist in Russia. Virtually all of the detainees were Crimean Solidarity activists. The organization appeared in April 2016, when relatives of arrested, missing and kidnapped Crimean Tatars decided to unite for mutual assistance.
The first meeting was organized by the Crimean Contact Group for Human Rights, which was created in 2014 to search for abducted and missing people, as well as for a possible dialogue with the Russian authorities in Crimea. The dialogue did not work out, but Crimean Solidarity was born. On the day of the official opening, lawyer Emil Kurbedinov noted: “This day became the day of creating a platform for joint actions of the families of Muslims arrested in Crimea.” A little time passed, and activists, citizen journalists, bloggers, including those who were persecuted for disloyalty on the peninsula, regardless of religion, joined Solidarity. The main blow of the courts on December 18 fell on Solidarity activists.
The reaction of Crimean Tatar activists to the arrests in Bakhchisarai was impressive: two weeks later, about a hundred Crimean Tatars across the peninsula came out with single pickets against the repression of the security forces. “I demand to stop oppressing our people”, “Stop mocking our people”, “Stop the lawlessness of the security forces of Crimea”, “Lies are a sin! Crimean Tatars are not terrorists”, “Searching for terrorists in Crimea is a hopeless task” - these and similar posters were held by the participants stock. The massive scale and geography of the pickets, if they caused the security forces to become confused, did not last long. On the same day, 49 people were detained, some of them being taken away by people in civilian clothes in civilian cars.
Emil Kurbedinov
Advocate Emil Kurbedinov then he feared that the events of 2014–2015 could repeat, when Crimean Tatar and pro-Ukrainian activists were kidnapped either by Russian security forces or fighters of the armed group “Crimean Self-Defense.” The rest of the picketers were not detained, but then for several months they were served with subpoenas for administrative proceedings. “Summoning us and questioning us, they picked out everything in our every word to find out the organizer,” said one of the picket participants after the interrogation. “They asked who brought me to the picket site, what color were the markers and who gave them to me to write a poster "This is such an absurdity. I said that the organizer was here - my heart ached, and I left. And there can be many such aching hearts."
Officially, the press service of the Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for Crimea reported that “for violations of the requirements of the federal law “On meetings, rallies, demonstrations, processions and pickets”, 49 citizens who participated in the picketing were brought to the internal affairs bodies. After receiving explanations from them and carrying out preventive conversations, all participants in the events were released from the premises of the police department." There was no other visible reaction, but the resignation of the head of the State Committee for Interethnic Relations and Deported Citizens of the Republic of Crimea is associated with the large-scale protest action of the Crimean Tatars on the peninsula. - RS) Zaura Smirnova, who was accused of inability to control Crimean Tatar activity. State Duma deputy from Crimea Ruslan Balbek called the pickets a “managed provocation.”
In response, the same lawyer expressed a general opinion Emil Kurbedinov: “I’ve been observing the statements of some “politicians” and other “well-wishers” regarding the pickets that took place throughout Crimea on October 14, who say “they are controlled from the outside...”, “these are provocateurs...” and other nonsense . People came out because of the endless lawlessness - arbitrariness of the security forces, persecution, kidnappings and torture (not a single kidnapping has yet been solved), "pocket" courts and trials! They are trying to define the Crimean Tatars - Muslims as terrorists and extremists by fabricating criminal cases!"
Meeting of participants in the Crimean Solidarity movement, November 2017
Even more important for the security forces was to find the organizer of the pickets. The investigators and local police officers talked about this with all the participants in the action, however, none of them gave evidence. Lawyer Lilya Gemedzhi on the night before December 18, she wrote on Facebook: “The authorities believe that during the conduct of single pickets there was a single plan and organization, which confirms the publicity of the event, which was not sanctioned by the authorities. Another thing is obvious. A single organization and a single plan to suppress freedom of expression, freedom peaceful assemblies and violation of the rights of the indigenous people of Crimea are seen in the actions of the authorities." Gemedzhi is sure that all “decisions are dictated” and will not be justified.
“A single picket is the most vulnerable public event in Russia, which can easily be interrupted and declared illegal,” lawyer Alexander Popkov explained to the Krym.Realii publication. “There is a decision of the Constitutional Court of Russia No. 4-P of February 14, 2013, which says, "that if single pickets are supposedly united by a common intention, then these are not single pickets. With the help of this trick, the Russian authorities are trying to suppress any public actions, even those permitted by Russian law. Apparently, now they are trying to apply this practice in Crimea."
To prove the general intent of a series of single pickets, which would make it possible to bring all participants to administrative responsibility, specialists from the Crimean Forensic Laboratory were ordered a forensic examination - it was necessary to study the inscriptions on the posters and answer a number of questions: what is the subject of the inscriptions, their semantic content, Are they united by a single theme and a single concept? The analysis of all inscriptions was carried out approximately the same way. For example, a study of the inscription “Freedom for political prisoners” led experts to the opinion that “the author addresses an addressee who is not named, but may be a representative of the authorities and security forces, with an incentive to release from prison people accused of political activities directed against the authorities authorities".
Most of the inscriptions were characterized as a manifestation of “the author’s negative attitude towards the negative actions of the government of the Russian Federation,” for example: “Rulers of the Russian Federation, give back to the children and stop illegally arresting their breadwinners.” Images of posters for the expert were collected not only from among the detained participants, but also on social networks, especially on the Crimean Solidarity page and on the websites of Crimea.Realities and the QHA news agency. “The theme of the inscriptions recorded on the posters is negative actions against Crimean Tatar Muslims (unjustified, in their opinion, accusations of terrorism and extremism, repression) on the part of the current government and law enforcement agencies,” the linguist expert concluded. He admitted that the inscriptions are united by “a single ideological and thematic focus.” Actually, this made it possible to accuse the picketers of holding a single unauthorized event.
Photo of one of the single pickets of the Crimean Tatars in the examination materials
In addition to the examination, evidence of the picketers’ unified plan, judging by the documents of the case file, was “homogeneous coloring materials” for the police, with the help of which some posters were made. “The pickets were “united by the unity of purpose, plan and general organization,” sums up the head of the department for organizing the application of administrative legislation of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for Crimea. “It has been reliably established that a group of people of the Crimean Tatar population took part in a public event in the form of a picket that was not coordinated with local authorities.”
“Veiled as single pickets” is how police actions of the Crimean Tatars are called in “survey reports.” In addition to the linguistic one, another examination was carried out, during which the paper, font, execution of the inscriptions, and the color of the posters were compared - obviously, they were looking for something common in them. It is interesting that the police operational reports directly contrast the Crimean Tatars and other Crimeans: the action, according to the police, was carried out by the “Crimean Tatar population” of the peninsula, which, according to the police, caused discontent among the “Slavic population.”
With the help of two examinations, unity was found between the pickets, and they began to be considered as one unauthorized public event. On December 18, everyone who could be identified from photographs was summoned to the courts for administrative proceedings. A total of 76 meetings are scheduled for this day.
“I think that both the choice of date and the number of courts in this case play more of a symbolic, and only then a practical significance. Almost all my friends have the first association when mentioning the number “18” - the day of deportation of the Crimean Tatars. The large number of courts based on nationality adds color into this picture,” notes the human rights activist Lutfiye Zudieva. – If we use simple calculations, then 10 courts in different regions of Crimea are trying Crimean Tatars for the right to express their civic position. Moreover, a single picket is a right of every person prescribed by the law of the Russian Federation. For more daring desires, standard mechanisms for the Russian Federation are provided - “extremism”, “terrorism”, “separatism”. Therefore, their main goal is to intimidate. That is, they want to tell us all: this is what will happen to everyone who dares to vote or express their point of view.”
The human rights activist also notes that there are simply not enough defenders for such a number of courts. On the same day, hearings were scheduled in Crimea on the “February 26 case” about the mass unrest in February 2014, as well as an appeal against the sentence of journalist Nikolai Semena. “They want to leave people without protection and, precisely in such conditions, to persuade and prove that single pickets had a “single plan”, “one organizer”, etc. I think that both the mentality of the Crimean Tatars and their collective spirit are still not they found proper appreciation from the security forces, understanding even more so. Therefore, in Crimea they simply do not know how to deal with this peaceful non-violent resistance. And every day it reaches a new level and is gaining momentum that is undesirable for the security forces," states Zudieva.
Dilyaver Memetov (in the foreground)
The coordinator of “Crimean Solidarity” also speaks about the peaceful resistance of the Crimean Tatars on this day. Dilyaver Memetov: “The single pickets on October 14 became an example of the very peaceful resistance and mutual support that have long been characteristic of the Crimean Tatar people. The idea that our people are not terrorists and extremists is a popular opinion that will never be changed or broken! Of course, the repressive machine does not look at anything, even the fact that these people took advantage of their constitutional right. However, this is not the first time for our people to experience such acts of intimidation and intimidation. Therefore, we must not agree with the lies and slander that they want to hang on us. And only by professing our religion, preserving our culture, supporting, caring for each other, showing solidarity in a common misfortune, we will be able to pass all the tests as in previous times."
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