72 years after Crimean Tatar deportation
18 May Ukraine commemorates the 72nd anniversary of the deportation of Crimean Tatars by the Soviet Union, in which thousands of people who were deported to Central Asia and endured long months of dire living conditions are thought to have died of starvation and disease.
On May 18, 1944, tens of thousands of Crimean Tatars were deported to Central Asia by Stalin's Soviet regime, which accused them of collaborating with occupying Nazi forces. Around 180,000 people were deported to various regions within Soviet territory, in particular Siberia and Uzbekistan. Almost half of the exiles, who endured long months of dire living conditions, are thought to have died of starvation and disease. This 30-year exile continued until 1987, when the Soviet government allowed 2,300 Crimean Tatars to return to their homeland. Another 19,300 people followed in 1988. Thousands came back after Soviet Unions collapsed.
In 2013, a year before Russia’s annexation of the Black Sea Peninsula, more than 260,000 Crimean Tatars were living on the peninsula. Nearly 150, 000 Crimean Tatars live in Uzbekistan, half a million - in Turkey, and tens of thousands – in Bulgaria and Romania.
On November 12, 2015, Ukraine’s Parliament adopted a resolution recognizing the event as genocide and declared 18 May as a Day of Remembrance for the victims of Crimean Tatar genocide.
The U.N. Rights Office is calling for the protection of rights of minorities in Crimea on the 72nd anniversary of Stalin’s mass deportation of Tatars from their homeland. The UN is also calling on Russia to lift the ban on the Mejilis.
