Translated material
The court approved the extension of the arrest of five defendants in the second Simferopol case of Hizb ut-Tahrir
The Military Court of Appeal in Vlasikha approved the extension of the arrest of those involved in the case of the second Simferopol group of Hizb ut-Tahrir, Enver Ametov, Osman Arifmemetov, Yashar Muedinov, Ruslan Suleymanov and Rustem Sheykhaliev. Crimean Solidarity reports this.
Earlier, the Southern District Military Court extended the Crimean Tatars’ stay in a pre-trial detention center until September 20.
During the hearing, political prisoners filed a petition for the right to speak in their native language, but the court rejected this petition.
All five are accused of participating in the activities of a terrorist organization (Part 2 of Article 205.5 of the Criminal Code) and preparing for a violent seizure of power (Article 278 using Part 1 of Article 30 of the Criminal Code). Their case has been pending in court since the end of 2020.
- On March 10 , March 18 and May 12, the Southern District Military Court sentenced fifteen other defendants in the second Simferopol Hizb ut-Tahrir case to prison terms ranging from 12 to 19 years.
- On March 27, 2019, mass searches took place in villages in the suburbs of Simferopol, where Crimean Tatars predominantly live. Then FSB officers detained twenty people in Crimea, and three more people a few days later in Rostov-on-Don. In total, 29 Crimean Tatars are involved in the second Simferopol case. Four are wanted, the rest are in custody. Before the case was brought to court, the accused were divided into groups of five, and the case of each group was considered at a separate court hearing. The publication “Krym.Realii” published a detailed report on the case of the second Simferopol group “Hizb ut-Tahrir”.
- Hizb ut-Tahrir was recognized as a terrorist organization in Russia. In this regard, criminal cases are being initiated in different regions of the country, with defendants being sentenced to various terms in a maximum security colony only on the basis that they met in apartments, read religious literature and disseminated their ideas. According to a number of experts, Hizb ut-Tahrir was unlawfully recognized as a terrorist organization, since its participants in Russia did not prepare or carry out terrorist acts.
- According to the Memorial Human Rights Center, as of March 22, 2022, at least 340 people are being persecuted in connection with their involvement with Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami. Of these, at least 231 people were convicted, and 176 of them were sentenced to terms of more than ten years in prison. Most of the defendants - 94 people - are from Crimea and Sevastopol. Tatarstan is in second place: at least 81 people from this region are being persecuted in connection with their involvement in Hizb ut-Tahrir. In third place is Bashkiria (53 participants).