You're reading: Ukraine’s Rada calls on international society to condemn violations of Crimean Tatars’ rights

Ukraine's Verkhovna Rada has called on the UN, the European Parliament, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, the OSCE Parliamentary assembly, and the world leaders to condemn the violations of the rights and freedoms of Crimean Tatars. A total of 247 parliamentarians voted for the resolution to this effect on May 14.

“The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine: demands that Russia immediately stop the policies aimed at violations of human rights and freedoms in Crimea […] including the rights of Crimean Tatars as an indigenous people of Ukraine; […] calls on the international community to condemn the forcible deportation of Crimean Tatars carried out by the Communist regime of the USSR on May 18, 1944, and also the current actions by Russia aimed at violating the rights of Crimean Tatars as an indigenous people of Ukraine; calls on the world leaders and recognized public figures to take the necessary efforts to protect Crimean Tatars from discrimination and persecution by Russia,” the appeal says.

The resolution also calls on the international community to promote the resumption of the work of international human rights monitoring missions in Crimea and “make efforts to reinstate the rights and of former and current heads of the Crimean Tatar Mejlis Mustafa Jemilev and Refat Chubarov and public activists Ismet Yuksel and Sinaver Kadyrov to live in their homeland, as well as unimpeded entry in Crimea and exercise of their functions as heads and representatives of the Crimean Tatar Mejlis.”

The Verkhovna Rada also demanded that Russia extradite to Ukraine M. Jemilev’s son Khaiser and release Akhtem Chiygoz, deputy chairman of the Mejlis, and some other activists.

The parliamentarians called on the international community to “increase the pressure on Russia to resume the jurisdiction of Ukraine within the limits of its internationally recognized borders.”