Tense Situation in Crimea, Statement of ICC
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Date: Mon, 18 Jan 1999 12:14:03 +0200 (EET)
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Subject: Tense Situation in Crimea, Statement of ICC
MINELRES moderator <[email protected]>
Original sender: Mehmet Tutuncu <[email protected]>
Tense Situation in Crimea, Statement of ICC
Dear Readers,
The Crimean Tatar National Mejlis (Assembly) in Simferopol, Crimea,
was bombed and burned in the early hours of January 15, 1999. The
office of the Chair of the Mejlis, Mustafa Abdulcemil Kirimoglu, was
completely destroyed, and the building including the communications
equipment sustained considerable damage. The fact that water and
telephone services were cut off to the building prior to the attack
strongly suggests a well planned sabotage.
International Committee for Crimea (ICC) has published following
press-communique. Please sign at the bottom to support, and include
your town. Then send it back to <[email protected]>. Please forward this
message to as many people as possible, and ask them also to sign this
letter.
--- PRESS COMMUNIQUE ---
ICC (International Committe fro Crimea)
17 January 1999
Tense Situation in Crimea, Ukraine
The new constitution of Crimea and the bombing of the Crimean Tatar
National Mejlis (Assembly) building in Simferopol
We, as members of the International Committee for Crimea (ICC), are
extremely concerned with the recent developments in Crimea and
Ukraine. A proposed constitution for the Autonomous Republic of
Crimea, which was approved by the Ukrainian Parliament in December
1998, has been signed into effect by the Ukrainian President Leonid
Kuchma. In the early hours of 15 January 1999, the Crimean Tatar
National Mejlis was bombed and the building sustained severe damage.
We deplore this act of violence against the Crimean Tatar people. We
are further concerned because the new constitution fails to protect
adequately political and cultural rights of about 275,000 Crimean
Tatars, who make up over 10% of Crimea's population of 2,700,000.
Crimean Tatars are the native people who inhabited the Crimean
peninsula for over five centuries. In 1944, they were wrongly accused
of collaboration with the Nazis and deported en masse to the distant
lands of the Soviet Union. Most of the Russians and Ukrainians in
Crimea today settled there in the last 50 years. The Tatars who
returned to Crimea under difficult conditions, without any outside
assistance for deported people, now face discrimination and hostility
in their own ancestral homeland.
Today Crimean Tatars have no representation in the Crimean Parliament,
and the new constitution does not allow for their political
participation. It will not be possible, for example, to elect
delegates to the Crimean Parliament because they do not constitute a
majority in any given voting district. Their own democratically
elected body, Crimean Tatar National Mejlis, is not recognized by the
Crimean Parliament or the Ukrainian government.
Most of the Tatars who have returned to Crimea live in substandard
housing, with no plumbing, electricity, or adequate roads. Their
attempts to establish Tatar-language schools have met with strong
opposition from the local people. The new Crimean constitution does
not allow for funding of Tatar schools. Approximately half of the
Tatars in Crimea are yet to be given Ukrainian citizenship, and they
remain ineligible to use available health-care and social services.
As members of the International Committee for Crimea, we are deeply
concerned that the current political and social conditions in Crimea
are not conducive to the survival of Crimean Tatars as an ethnic
minority. They have the right to live in their ancestral homeland with
constitutional guarantees, and free of social and economic prejudices
against them. With the approval of the new constitution, however, the
situation is likely get worse, the recent bombing of the Crimean Tatar
Mejlis building being a prime example.
We strongly urge the Ukrainian authorities to protect and respect the
rights of Crimean Tatars. We ask the Kuchma government to rebuild the
Crimean Tatar Mejlis building and provide full protection for the
Mejlis. The first step towards full protection will start with the
recognition of the Crimean Tatar National Mejlis as the sole
representative body of the Crimean Tatar people. We call on the
international community to be aware of the multitude of problems
Crimean Tatars are experiencing in their homeland and help prevent
further attacks on the long suffering Crimean Tatars, who have not
resorted to violence in their efforts to resettle in Crimea.
Mubeyyin Batu Altan, Boston, MA, USA
Inci Bowman, Washington, DC, USA
Mehmet Tutuncu, Haarlem, The Netherlands
............
...........
>>>>>>>>
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