The Head of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people, Refat Chubarov, during his speech at a side event at the 21st session of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Peoples, said that the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation into Ukraine is a consequence of the fact that international organizations in 2014 failed to take effective actions that forced the Russian Federation to abandon its criminal plans in relation to Ukraine.
Full text of the speech
The armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine began in February 2014, when Russian troops invaded the Crimean peninsula, and at gunpoint Moscow simulated an action that the Kremlin to this day unsuccessfully tries to present as a referendum in which the population of Crimea allegedly exercised their right to self-determination by deciding to annex Crimea to Russia.
Needless to say, the international community, international organizations, including the UN, not only did not recognize the attempted annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation, but also strongly condemned the actions of the Russian Federation.
But then, in February-March 2014, neither the UN nor other international organizations, including the OSCE, the Council of Europe, the European Union, could take effective actions that would force the Russian Federation to abandon its criminal plans against the Ukrainian state and, in general, against global world.
The terrible consequences of the failure of the UN and its institutions to effectively protect global peace in accordance with the norms and principles of international law in the case when the aggressor is a permanent member of the UN Security Council, as in the case of the Russian Federation, the whole world is now watching every day, starting from February 24, 2022 of the year.
As a result of the fierce and bloody battles caused by the full-scale invasion of Russian troops on the mainland of Ukraine, the killing of thousands of civilians of Ukraine, the destruction of dozens of cities and towns in the country, the attention of the international community to the human rights situation and the rights of the indigenous peoples of Ukraine – the Crimean Tatar, Karaite and Krymchak – like it faded into the background.
Moreover, in the newly occupied territories of Ukraine – Kherson and part of the Zaporizhzhia regions – the special services of the Russian Federation launched a targeted persecution of civil society activists, accompanied by violent kidnappings, beatings, illegal detentions and imprisonment.
At the same time, the Crimean Peninsula, occupied by the Russian Federation in 2014, the cradle of all three indigenous peoples of Ukraine – the Crimean Tatar, Karaite and Krymchak, was used by the occupying power as the main springboard, from where armadas of Russian military equipment and tens of thousands of Russian soldiers invaded on the morning of February 24, 2022 to mainland Ukraine.
From the territory of the occupied Crimea, Russian troops daily carry out rocket attacks on Ukrainian cities, military planes take off from Crimean airfields to bomb Ukrainian cities, Russian warships located in the Black and Azov Seas are involved in rocket attacks on cities and towns of Ukraine.
Of course, all these facts will become the basis for bringing the Russian Federation to responsibility and punishment for such a clear and cynical violation of international instruments regarding the rights of indigenous peoples, in particular, the use of their territories for military operations.
However, in this war, which has been going on for more than 8 years, the Ukrainian political nation has crystallized, of which the indigenous peoples of Ukraine are also an integral part.
Representatives of the indigenous peoples of Ukraine, together with other citizens of Ukraine, defend the sovereignty of their state with weapons in their hands.
The heroic rebuff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine to the Russian invaders, the high morale and unity of the Ukrainian society, the unprecedented international consolidation and support of Ukraine, strengthened the hopes of the residents of the temporarily occupied Crimea – the indigenous Crimean Tatar people, Karaites, Krymchaks, ethnic Ukrainians, people of other ethnicities – for the speedy liberation of Crimea from Russian occupants.