Emir-Usein Kuku and Russia’s savage persecution of Crimean Tatar human rights defenders

Emir-Usein Kuku is turning 48 on 26 June, his ninth birthday in Russian captivity as retaliation for his human rights work in occupied Crimea.  His children, Bekir and Safiye, were just 9 and 5, when the FSB and other enforcement officers violently burst into their home on 11 February 2016 and took their father away in handcuffs.  If Russia has its way, both will be young adults by the time Kuku is released.  While imperative that Russia does not get its way, there are grounds for believing that the Russian FSB’s plans were even more sinister.  The fake ‘terrorism’ charges against Kuku were concocted less than a year after an attempted abduction was thwarted.  As well as political persecution, Russia also brought enforced disappearances to occupied Crimea, with their victims, including several Crimean Tatar civic activists, never seen again.    

Kuku’s father was a veteran of the Crimean Tatar national movement, and their home was always a centre for people seeking help.  Kuku was also unwilling to stand by when young Crimean Tatars began disappearing and repression mounted under Russian occupation.  He joined the Crimean Contact Group on Human Rights and was in charge of monitoring violations in the Yalta region.

The violent attack and likely abduction attempt took place on 20 April 2015, and only turned into an FSB search after passers-by heard Kuku’s cries for help.  A malignant role on this occasion, later in 2015, and then on 11 February 2016, was played by Aleksandr Kompaneitsev, a further Ukrainian SBU officer turned traitor, who is now working for Russia’s FSB.  Kuku had first riled Kompaneitsev by rejecting his demand that he collaborate with the FSB, and then by refusing to remain silent about the beating he had received. 

It had been clear since April 2015 that Kuku was being targeted because of his human rights activism, and it is no accident that it was the especially brutal and gratuitously violent arrests on 11 February 2016 of Emir-Usein Kuku; Muslim Aliev; Inver Bekirov and Vadym Siruk, as well as two much younger men – Refat Alimov and Arsen Dzhepparov (arrested on 18 April) that led to the emergence of the Crimean Solidarity human rights movement.  Kuku was the first of very many Crimean Tatar civic activists or journalists to face spurious ‘terrorism’ charges, based solely on claims of involvement in Hizb ut-Tahrir.  This peaceful, transnational Muslim organization is legal in Ukraine and most other countries, and Russia’s Supreme Court has never explained why it declared Hizb ut-Tahrir ‘terrorist’ in 2003.  Such ‘Hizb ut-Tahrir trials’ have been used very actively in occupied Crimea as a weapon against civic journalists and activists, especially from Crimean Solidarity.

Muslim Aliev (b. 1971) and Inver Bekirov (b. 1963) were accused of having ‘organized’ an entirely unproven Hizb ut-Tahrir ‘cell’, under Article 205.5 § 1 of Russia’s criminal code.  Emir-Usein Kuku (b. 1976); Vadym Siruk (b. 1989); Refat Alimov (b. 1991); Arsen Dzhepparov (b. 1991) were accused of ‘involvement in this ‘cell’ under Article 205.5 § 2.  Later, all six men were also charged with ‘‘planning to violently seize power’ under Article 278.

The ‘trial’ was profoundly flawed, with the only ‘evidence’ coming from fake FSB-loyal ‘experts’ and anonymous witnesses.  This, however, was a political trial, with ‘judges’ Roman Viktorovich Saprunov; Dmitry Viktorovich Merkulov and Roman Vladimirovich Podolsky (from the Southern District Military Court in Rostov providing the six guilty verdicts required of them.  These were, on 25 June 2020, upheld by Oleg Aleksandrovich Yegorov; Aleksander Aleksandrovich Mordovin and Anatoly Valentinovich Solin.  Despite having committed no crime,  Muslim Aliev  and Inver Bekirov were sentenced to 19 years; Emir-Usein Kuku  and Vadim Siruk to 12 years; Refat Alimov to 8 years and Arsen Dzhepparov to 7 years.  All of the sentences were to be served in the harshest of Russian prison colonies, with the men held thousands of kilometres from their families in Crimea.

All six men were recognized as political prisoners by Memorial (now the Memorial Support for Political Prisoners Project) and as prisoners of conscience by Amnesty International.  Their release has been demanded by the UN General Assembly and other international bodies , yet Refat Alimov and Arsen Dzhepparov were forced to serve their sentences to the last day, and the other men remain imprisoned. 

Please help ensure that Emir-Usein; Muslim Aliev; Inver Bekirov and Vadym Siruk are not forgotten!  Russia has made it impossible to live in occupied parts of Ukraine without taking Russian citizenship and then uses such citizenship as excuse for blocking exchanges of prisoners.  The men are Ukrainian nationals who need our support, and our voices. 

You can also write letters!  They are a lifeline to the men and send an important message to Moscow that its treatment of Ukrainian political prisoners is under scrutiny. Letters need to be in Russian, handwritten, and on ‘safe’ subjects.  If that is a problem, use the sample letter below (copying it by hand), perhaps adding a picture or photo. Do add a return address so that the men can answer. 

Example letter

Привет,

Желаю Вам крепкого здоровья и надеюсь, Вы скоро вернетесь домой, к своим родным.  Простите, что мало пишу – мне трудно писать по-русски, но мы все о Вас помним.

[Hi.  I wish you good health and hope that you will soon be home, with your family. I’m sorry that this letter is short – it’s hard for me to write in Russian., but you are not forgotten. ] 

Addresses (these can be in English or Russian, as below)

Muslim Aliev

453256, Россия, Республика Башкортостан, г. Салават, станция Южный, ФКУ ИК-2 

Алиеву, Муслиму Нуриевичу, 1971 г.р. 

[In English:  Russian Federation, 453256, Bashkortostan, Salavat, Stantsiya Yuzhny, Prison No. 2

Aliev, Muslim Nurievich, b. 1971 ]

Inver Bekirov

453256, Россия, Республика Башкортостан, г. Салават, станция Южный, ФКУ ИК-2  

Бекирову, Инверу Небиевичу, 1963 г.р

[In English:  Russian Federation, 453256, Bashkortostan, Salavat, Stantsiya Yuzhny, Prison No. 2

Bekirov, Inver Nebiyevich, b. 1963 ]

Vadym Siruk

453256, Россия, Республика Башкортостан, г. Салават, станция Южный, ФКУ ИК-2  

Сируку, Вадиму Андреевичу, 1989 г.р.

[In English:  Russian Federation, 453256, Bashkortostan, Salavat, Stantsiya Yuzhny, Prison No. 2

Siruk, Vadim Andreevich, b. 1989 ]