Head of the Board of the Crimean Tatar Resource Center, Head of the Department of Legal Affairs and Foreign Affairs of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people Eskender Bariiev, in an interview with Public Radio, told why the national-territorial autonomy of the Crimean Tatar people within Ukraine is urgent now?
“The autonomy that took place in independent Ukraine was not just like that, because there were prerequisites: the statehood of the Crimean Tatars, the struggle of the Crimean Tatar national movement for independence from Russia, the first Kurultai and the Crimean People’s Republic in 1917-1918, the Crimean ASSR, which was liquidated after the deportation. 1944, the struggle of the Crimean Tatar national movement, when the Order of the people was adopted, – the expert explained.
Bariiev noted that when considering the concept of Crimean autonomy, we are not talking only about the rights of the Crimean Tatars, that Crimea is only for the Crimean Tatars. It is understood that in a unitary Ukrainian state there can be autonomy not on a territorial basis, but on a national-territorial one.
“When we talk about the national-territorial autonomy of the Crimean Tatars, we also mean the form of the right to self-determination of the indigenous people. Now we need to make many changes to the laws and the Constitution of Ukraine. For so far in Art. 10 of the Constitution there is a conflict that within a unitary country there is autonomy on a territorial basis. Which is a prerequisite for insinuations from the Russian Federation on the territory of Ukraine”,- Bariiev added.