Crimean Tatar Resource Center estimates that over the course of the first six months of 2019, there were registered sixty-eight cases of the right to physical and mental health denial, twenty-nine cases of which were in relation to the indigenous Crimean Tatar people. The number of cases in the second quarter of this year is four-time higher than in the first quarter and is more than twice as high as in the first six months of 2018. Then, there were thirty such cases registered.
In the majority of cases, detainees were not provided with the necessary medical help that resulted in deterioration of their health condition. Some political prisoners were forced to go through psychiatric expertise.
The right to physical and mental health was repeatedly denied to Ukrainian prisoners of war, defendants of the “Ukrainian saboteurs’case” – Vladimir Dudka, Andrey Zakhtey, Yvgeniy Panov; defendants of “Hizb-ut-Tahrir” case – Enver Seitosmanov, Teymur Abdullaev, Arsen Abkhairov, Eskender Abdulhaniev, Rustem Emiruseinov, Server Zekiryaev, Servet Gaziev, Memet Belyalov, Raim Aivazov, and others; defendants of “Vedzhie Kashka case” – Crimean Tatar activist, Riza Asanov, civil journalist, Nariman Memediminov; other political prisoners – Olexandr Steshenko, Andrey Kolomiets, Hennadiy Lemeshko, Evgeniy Karakashev, Vladimir Balukh, and Edem Bekirov. The right to health was also denied to the wife of detained Riza Omerov, Sevil Omerova.