On Monday, April 10, the Day of Crimean Tatar Journalism is celebrated. It is today that marks 140 years since the world saw the first issue of the Crimean Tatar newspaper Terciman (Translator).
Terciman was the most famous Turkic-language newspaper. With his work, Ismail Gasprinsky, who became its author and editor, paved the way for the development of the literary heritage of the Crimean Tatar language.
Since the beginning of its activity, since 2015, the Crimean Tatar Resource Center in every possible way contributes to the development and preservation of the Crimean Tatar language:
— the CTRC website is available in four languages, one of which is Crimean Tatar;
– in 2019, the Crimean Tatar Resource Center translated the Universal Declaration of Human Rights into the Crimean Tatar language and posted it on the official UN resource. And in 2021, we translated the European Convention on Human Rights into the Crimean Tatar language. We also plan to translate Ukrainian legislation related to Crimea and Crimean Tatars;
— The CTRC is conducting an information campaign dedicated to the restoration of historical place names in Crimea Return the names – Return the Crimea, which also contributes to the preservation of the Crimean Tatar language.
In addition, we want to remind you that those Crimean Tatar journalists who continue to work in the occupied Crimea since 2014 deserve attention.
Yes, at first professional journalists continued to work on the peninsula, but as pressure increased, most of them were forced to leave for mainland Ukraine, as happened, for example, with the first Crimean Tatar TV channel ATR. After its blocking in the Crimea, the CTRC contributed to the resumption of activities in Kyiv.
As a result of repressions on the territory of the peninsula, civic journalism began to develop. Already, among the numerous political prisoners of the Kremlin there are 12 activists, citizen journalists, bloggers: Server Mustafayev, Timur Ibrahimov, Marlen Asanov, Seyran Saliiev, Remzi Bekirov, Ruslan Suleymanov, Osman Arifmemetov, Rustem Sheykhaliev, Amet Suleymanov, Riza Izetov, Emir-Huseyn Kuku and Nariman Dzhelyalov.
The peninsula was turned into a territory of lawlessness with the least level of freedom of speech.
The Crimean Tatar Resource Center calls on the international community to continue to increase pressure on the occupying state so that our compatriots can continue their professional activities.