Since Russia invaded and annexed Crimea in 2014, I have witnessed firsthand the ongoing ethnic cleansing against my people. Crimean Tatars’ land and right to exist freely have been taken away. Our rights have been grossly violated for nearly a decade, with acts of genocide systematically committed against us.
The Russian media constantly focuses on the rights of Russians and Russian speakers in Ukrainian territory, ignoring the fact that the state language in Ukraine is Ukrainian and that the indigenous people of Ukraine are the Crimean Tatars, who have the right to study and develop their own language and culture.
Prior to the Russian invasion of Crimea in 1783, when imperial policy was aimed at expelling the indigenous Crimean Tatar people from their native land, Tatars accounted for between 80-90% of the population. Soviet authorities continued this ideology in the mid-20th century, deporting the entire Crimean Tatar people in 1944.
