FSB and Crimean "loss"

How and why Crimean Tatars disappear on the annexed peninsula and who can stand behind this

After the annexation of Crimea by Russia, cases of loss of people, mainly from the Crimean Tatars, were more frequent in the territory of the peninsula. The Investigative Committee of Crimea claims that "there are no mass disappearance of the Crimean Tatars on the peninsula."

The last missing one is Erwin Ibrahimov , a member of the regional Majlis. The man disappeared at night near his house in Bakhchisarai. Around midnight, Erwin called his father to find out where the documents for the car were stored. A few hours later, going in search, his father discovered his son, who was abandoned near the house: the doors were open, the keys were inserted into the ignition. The next morning, Ervin was going to go to Sudak with his colleagues, where he was appointed a trial of the Crimean Tatar activists, but he never appeared at the meeting. Neither Erwin's parents nor his colleagues know where he can be.

The very moment of abduction was recorded by the cameras of external video surveillance placed at one of the nearby stores. According to the First Deputy Medzhlis Nariman Dzhelyalov, people in the form of traffic police officers who stopped Erwin Ibrahimov were recorded on the video, they took him out of the car and put him in another car, and then left. “There is a fact of abduction, in our opinion, because if there was a detention, then, by law, Erwin had the right to inform the closest relatives and call lawyers,” says Jelalov, separately noting that the Crimean Tatars are not faced with cases where people in the form of law enforcement officials, in particular the traffic police, participate in anticonant activities.

The abduction of Erwin Ibragimov, video from surveillance cameras:

A few days later , a passport, driver’s license and work book Erwin Ibragimov were found on the street. There are no official messages from law enforcement agencies regarding the fate of the activist. Nariman Dzhelalov believes that the abduction of a young activist is called upon to sow fear among the rest:

- At the moment, there is no information about his whereabouts, health, alive or not. Unfortunately, nothing is known. Why exactly he? We are all lost in conjecture, because he was just beginning active political activity, did not have time to become particularly ill with some special, but for some reason the choice fell on him. Perhaps the abduction of such a figure should sow fear among the rest.

- How many people have gone since the annexation of the peninsula?

- Different numbers are called. In Kyiv, about two dozen people talk about, we tend to talk about a fewer missing. Several of the missing were later found dead - Ametov and Eden Asanov will decide. The latter is credited with suicide through hanging, but many of us doubt that law enforcement agencies are objective. All other missing guys, according to our estimates, are about a dozen people. Some of them disappeared two years ago, but so far neither we nor relatives have any news.

- Do they only kidnap activists or are there any cases when they abduct ordinary citizens?

- Different people disappear. In particular, one guy disappeared and at first we did not understand that it could encourage someone to abduct him until it found that he was in a group of football fans who played for the territorial integrity of Ukraine in February 2014. We believe that this could be somehow connected with its disappearance. At that time, the situation was poorly controlled, there was Crimean “self -defense” everywhere, and these are people who were not tested either for a psychological state or discipline. Anyone was typed in self -defense, and they could act from their own motives.

People whom we consider to be stolen, eight people, responsible for this, we consider the security forces

Unfortunately, now we cannot prove anything, we only have assumptions. “Self -Defense” no longer acts so actively, therefore, if the disappearance occurs, we believe that power structures are involved in this - as is the case with Erwin Ibragimov. Such people whom we consider to be stolen, eight people, responsible for this, we consider the security forces.

Firstly, their direct task is to ensure security, but we do not observe the progress in investigations, and in some cases we believe that they are involved in ourselves. We cannot make other assumptions to whom the disappearance of the Crimean Tatars is still beneficial here. A document of the Deputy Head of the FSB for Crimea Ibrahimov was published, which directly states that it is necessary to influence the activists of the Crimean Tatar National Movement in every possible way through searches and arrests. In addition, during the interrogations of many Crimean-Tatar children, employees of the law enforcement agencies directly threatened them that if they do not agree to cooperate, they could become, as the employees of the bodies are expressed, "losses". From this we conclude that the security forces plan such operations and participate in them themselves.

- How many police managed to find?

- You know, of those who are looking for Medzhlis (these are disappearance or abduction, which, in our opinion, are associated with the political situation), of which the police did not find anyone, alive in any case. Last May, three activists disappeared one after another : Leonid Korzh, Timur Shaimardanov, Seyran Zinedinov. All of them at that time were engaged in active activities, met with the Ukrainian military in units. They are associated with such an organization as the "Ukrainian house". We have assumptions and certain facts that say that it was exactly the abduction. Last summer, two guys disappeared in Belogorsk, there are witnesses who saw that they are forcibly put in a minibus, which we later repeatedly seen here and here in various situations. We have an assumption that power structures are involved in this.

-The Crimean Tatar movement has a rich experience in civilian resistance. Do you have a recipe for countering the current pressure?

-We cannot talk about a particular recipe. What we know for sure and remember is that our predecessors actively used methods of non -violent struggle, our activity should coincide with what is happening around Crimea. Today, we pay maximum attention to the awareness of people about dangers, how to act in certain situations and, most importantly, not to be afraid and defend our own rights. And of course, to be together, to inform each other, not to walk one at a time, ”says Nariman Jelalov .

The disappearance contributes to the abuse of the atmosphere of fear and hostility in the Crimea against everyone who is configured pro -Ukrainian

The Investigative Committee of the Peninsula believes that the statements of the Crimean Tatars about the abductions of people are not true. "According to statistics, of the total number of missing Crimeans (about 70 people), the share of those who disappeared under Ukraine, and those who disappeared after joining, are approximately 50 to 50. As for the national attribute, there are currently seven Crimean Tatars, three of them disappeared even before the transition (the annexation of the Crimea. - RS) are also listed. nationality, ”says the head of the Crimean administration of the Investigative Committee.

Human rights activists of the international organization Human Rights Watch do not agree with this position . “These disappearance contribute to the abuse of fear and hostility in the Crimea in relation to everyone who is configured by pro-Ukrainian, including the Crimean Tatars,” says Julia Gorbunova, HRW researcher in Europe and Central Asia. “The de facto power of Crimea should investigate all the versions of these disappearances, including the possibility of the involvement of militarized groups or Russian intelligence services,” - reported on the website of the human rights organization.

Olga Skripnik , coordinator of the Crimean Field Mission for Human Rights is investigated, about how the affairs of the Crimean Tatars are investigated in the Crimea:

- In a number of politically motivated abductions, we record that the investigation for far -fetched reasons either inhibits the investigation, or, in fact, closes it. For example, in the case of Ameetov’s decisions - in fact, this is the first victim of events in the Crimea of 2014 . In his case, for example, persons, representatives of the Crimean self -defense were clearly established, who stole him, put him in the car. They took testimonies from them, but they were assigned the status of only witnesses, and not suspects under the article "abduction, illegal imprisonment." Therefore, in some cases, people who, according to testimonies, are involved in the video, at best, receive only the status of witnesses, but not suspected in the investigation process.

- In your opinion, why do law enforcement agencies so reluctantly investigate these cases?

- You can understand their motivation: on the one hand, perhaps this is due to the fact that the power structures or the leadership of Crimea covers a number of disappearance, especially the disappearance of 2014. As, for example, it may be with the last disappearance of Erwin Ibragimov. The second is that in these disappearance, representatives of either the police or other law enforcement agencies, for example, the FSB or any other services, can be involved. What other motivations can be ...

In general, the characteristic of some events in Crimea allows us to talk about a certain discrimination. If we are talking about crimes against individual representatives (for example, these can be representatives of the Crimean Tatar people or various activists, both the Crimean Tatar and Ukrainian), then, unfortunately, the investigation today is very biased in Crimea. Because only those people who openly supported the actions of the Russian Federation remained in the investigation authorities and in the justice authorities, and thus, in principle, they are already engaged. Secondly, for example, as in the Hizb Ut-Tahrir case (this is, in fact, against Muslims in Crimea), a dangerous trend is noted.

This case was initiated by the current head of the Crimean FSB, Viktor Balagin , who had previously had several years of experience in Bashkiria. And he does not hide that a number of Russian employees from Bashkiria had transferred to Crimea with him. He had already come to Crimea with a certain stereotype and a label against Muslims - as terrorists and extremists. Although just in Crimea the specifics are such that Hizb Ut-Tahrir has never been an aggressive terrorist organization here, they were engaged in educational and political activities. Therefore, a priori it turns out that a number of investigative and power structures have a biased attitude towards Muslims, Ukrainian or Crimean-Tatar activists.

- Nariman Jelalov believes that security officials are involved in the disappearance of people. Do you agree with this assumption?

- Let's just say, we cannot exclude this option. Because over the past two years there were several disappearance, which involved at least the forces of “self -defense”, which, in fact, are personally controlled by Aksenov (head of Crimea Sergey Aksenov. - RS) and other power structures of Crimea. Moreover, if we talk about the recent disappearance of Ervin Ibragimov, that is, facts that allow us to say that power structures are involved. We distinguish between domestic disappearance and disappearance associated with professional or social activities of people. And earlier, in the affairs of Shaimardinov, Zindinov and others, the involvement of power structures in the disappearance was recorded.

-What do new authorities seek from the Crimean Tatar movement?

The situation is complicated by the fact that a fairly significant number of people disagree with the actions of Russia in Crimea

“I definitely can't say about all the goals.” Of course, there are political goals, since the Crimean Tatar people and their structures of self-organization have a rather serious political and public weight. Therefore, for the power that was established in the Crimea, it is fundamentally important to take control of any other bodies. If you look, for example, the practice of the last ten years in the Caucasus, then there were similar trends when, using anti -extremist, anti -terrorism legislation, with the help of the FSB and other instruments, local national structures or national forms of self -organization were taken under control to establish full control of the federal authorities.

In the same way, it happens in the Crimea. The situation is complicated by the fact that a fairly significant number of people disagree with the actions of Russia in the Crimea, and just one of them were the structures of the Crimean Tatar people, primarily Majlis, who organized, for example, a rally on February 26 [2014] against the actions of the Russian Federation and against the so-called referendum. Therefore, one of the goals, of course, take control of any social and national formations that have quite serious interests and influence.

This is a policy of intimidation and establishing certain templates

The second one can be connected with is the policy of intimidation and establishing certain templates, certain stereotypes in society. For example, that Muslims are supposedly extremists: that Crimean Tatars, that Majlis. In relation to Majlis, negative stereotypes are very clearly traced that this is an extremist organization, and this has already reached the level of court decision. In relation to many Ukrainian activists, if you analyze the enemy language, a lot of negative stereotypes are also used: that these are junta, fascists, Bandera and so on.

Moreover, it is worth noting that very many statements that have the enemy language are openly used not only at the household level, they are used by Aksenov, Konstantinov (Vladimir Konstantinov, chairman of the State Council of Crimea. - RS) , prosecutor Natalya Poklonskaya and many others who represent power in Crimea. And all these are dangerous trends that say that the current leadership of Crimea maintains such a biased attitude to vulnerable groups on the peninsula, ” Olga Skripnik expresses concern.