JUSTICE AND UNITY FOR CRIMEAN TATARS

          It has been well documented that after the Russian expansion in 1783, millions of Crimean Tatars were forced to leave their homeland, Crimea.  On May 18, 1944 this culminated to barbaric mass deportation by the USSR government, under inhuman conditions, to central Asia and Siberia.  Consequently, over 5 million Crimean Tatars were exiled and, today, they live in countries such as: Turkey, Romania, Uzbekistan, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Germany, USA, and Canada. Shortly after the USSR government collapsed in 1991, a significant number of Crimean Tatars returned to their ancestor homeland. 

In order to survive as a nation, we must restore and improve the political power of the Crimean Tatars in Crimea.  We need to unite all Crimean Tatar communities from Diaspora under one political “umbrella” to successfully identify, address and resolve the current social, political, and cultural issues of Diaspora.  A united front will enable us to provide an effective and efficient way to communicate these issues, which impact Crimean Tatars, at the national and international level.

One of these initiatives began with the creation of the Crimean Tatar Community of Canada, whose main objective is to unite all Crimean Tatars from Diaspora.  As part of this organization, we believe that there is an urgent need to create a new forum for discussion, open to all organizations from Crimean Tatar Diaspora.  A crucial priority of this forum is to provide information to Crimean Tatars in Diaspora, who do not have immediate access to sources of media, regarding their struggles, issues, and concerns.  Our plan is to organize conferences world-wide, in which Crimean Tatars can discuss historical events and share opinions, uniting us as a more powerful, internationally-recognized alliance.

 Some of the key issues which we would like to focus on are:

• the right of exiled Crimean Tatars to return to their homeland as citizen of the Crimean Tatar Autonomous Republic
• the right of legal way of restitution of land, houses and other commercial and residential properties confiscated after deportation
• restoration of human rights of Crimean Tatars
• the right to be recognized as indigenous people in our homeland Crimea .
• restoration of our national autonomy
• the deportation of Crimean Tatars and continued extermination during Stalinism regime must be brought to the attention of UN, European Court of Justice and United States Holocaust Memorial Council, as a Holocaust

 All these major issues must be addressed and integrated at a new level by obtaining legal methods and solutions especially as the present Ukrainian government has recently applied to be incorporated as a member of the European Union.  All the former East communist countries, such as Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Romania and Bulgaria, which are or will soon be members of the EU, have solved their human rights issues, have provided restitution of land and other properties, have reinstated the rights of minorities as part of their requirement in order to join the EU.  Therefore, by bringing together all these social, political and historical issues to the attention of the EU, Crimean Tatars have an opportunity to not only act as a social force (e.g. to reinforce the EU’s requirements for Ukraine to enter in the EU), but also to contribute to the future of Crimea as a nation…a united and prevailing nation.

The time to act is now – our voices, our parents’ voices, our elders’ voices need to heard and recognized.  The suffering, pain, and torment of our Crimean Tatars during the past decades cannot be forgotten.  There is tremendous work ahead, but Crimean Tatars from Diaspora can do it only united. We owe this to our ancestors who had fought for our rights and freedom and we also need to do this for our children’s future so that they can be proud of who they are and where they came from.

We appeal to all Crimean Tatar Communities from Diaspora to join the “International Organization of Crimean Tatars” and we would greatly appreciate the opportunity to discuss with you how we can plan together our next step.

 Iskender Ibram
Crimean Tatar Cultural Association of Canada