After the occupation of Crimea by the rf, detentions and arrests of people have become a regular practice. Unfortunately, political prisoners who are in Russian places of detention have to go through a real hell. After all, conditions in pre-trial detention centres and colonies are extremely bad, Russians violate the rights of political prisoners brutally, torture and threaten them.
Some political prisoners, so to speak, managed to escape from this hell and return to Ukrainein the frame of exchanges. So, for the entire time of the occupation of Crimea the following people were returned:
1. Gennadiy Afanasyev, who was previously sentenced to 7 years in a strict regime colony. The man was detained on 10 May 2014, and on 14 June 2016 was returned to Ukraine in the frame of exhange. In total, he stayed in the pre-trial detention centre for 2 years.
2. Akhtem Chiygoz, who was previously sentenced to 8 years in prison. The man was detained on 29 January 2015, and on 25 October 2017 was released and handed over to Turkey. In total, he stayed in the pre-trial detention centre for 2 years and 11 months.
3. Ilmi Umerov, who was previously sentenced to 2 years in a penal colony. The man was detained on 12 May 2016, but released on his own recognition and handed over to Turkey on 25 October 2017. He was under compulsory psychiatricexamination for 21 days from 18 August to 7 September 2017.
4. Oleg Sentsov, who was previously sentenced to 20 years in prison. The man was detained on 10 May 2014 and released on 7 September 2019 in the frame of exchange. In total, he stayed in the pre-trial detention centre for 5 years and 3 months.
5. Alexander Kolchenko, was previously sentenced to 10 years in a colony. The man was detained on 10 May 2014, and on 7 September 2019 was released in the frame of exchange . In total, he stayed in the pre-trial detention centre for 5 years and 3 months.
6. Yevgen Panov, who was previously sentenced to 8 years in a strict regime colony. The man was detained on 7 August , 2016, and released on 16 September 2019 in the frame of exchange. In total, he stayed in the pre-trial detention centre for 3 years and 1 month.
7. Volodymyr Balukh, who was previously sentenced to 3 years and 7 months. The man was detained on 8 December 2016, and released on 7 September 2019 in the frame of exchange. In total, he stayed in the pre-trial detention centre for 2 years and 9 months.
8. Edem Bekirov, who was previously sentenced to 7 years in prison. The man was detained on 12 December 2018, and released on 7 September 2019 in the frame of exchange. In total, he stayed in the pre-trial detention centre for 9 months.
9. Nariman Dzhelyal, who was previously sentenced to 17 years in prison. The man was detained on 3 September 2021 and released in the frame of exchange on 28 June 2024. In total, he stayed in Russian places of detention for almost 3 years.
These exchanges were the result of tremendous work of state authorities, public organizations, human rights defenders, activists and, of course, relatives of political prisoners.
Ten years of the occupation of Crimea have already passed. The number of political prisoners is growing rapidly. According to the Crimean Tatar Resource Centre, 334 political prisoners and those prosecuted in criminal “cases” during the occupation of Crimea have been recorded, 217 of them are representatives of the Crimean Tatar people.
Moreover, with the outbreak of full-scale war in Ukraine, the practice of persecution and repression of the pro-Ukrainian population spread in the newly occupied territories of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions.
The Crimean Tatar Resource Centre continues its active work at the local, national and international levels to draw attention to the criminal actions of the Russian Federation in the temporarily occupied Crimea, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions.
The Crimean Tatar Resource Centre demands the immediate release of all political prisoners. We will continue to work for the release of all hostages of the Kremlin who are still in places of detention in the Russian Federation. Each of them must return to their families. We are doing our best to make this happen as soon as possible.
The Crimean Tatar Resource Centre calls on the international community to increase pressure on the Russian Federation and the occupying authorities of Crimea to stop political persecution and to apply personal sanctions against those involved in human rights violations in the temporarily occupied territories.
