Lawyer Nikolai Polozov, commenting on the detention of Crimean Tatar activists on the night of November 2 to 3, said that a whole bunch of violations were observed in the actions of the Russian security forces. If the Russian authorities occupied Crimea and consider it their territory, then “they have no right to prohibit their citizens from moving anywhere within the country.”
“It is important to understand that there are no legal grounds not to let anyone (within the framework of the Russian legal field) pass from one conditional region to another conditional region. That is, if the Russian authorities occupied Crimea and consider it their territory, if they imposed on the inhabitants of Crimea their passports and their legislation (including the already amended Constitution), then prohibiting their citizens from moving anywhere within the country means directly violating Article 27 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, which guarantees freedom of movement”,- the lawyer explained.
In addition, in such actions of the Russian security officials there is a whole bunch of violations of various international treaties and conventions.
It should be reminded that on the night of November 2–3, the occupants en masse detained activists who were heading from Crimea to the city of Rostov-on-Don to announce the verdict to the defendants in the Hizb ut-Tahrir case. Some drivers were threatened with fines in the amount of 200 thousand rubles.