Russia imprisons at least 50 Crimean Tatars, other Ukrainians in revenge for Crimean civic blockade
Russia has abducted and imprisoned at least 50 Crimean Tatars and other Ukrainians for alleged involvement, while in mainland Ukraine in the Noman Çelebicihan Battalion. Despite the latter’s name, this was a peaceful, unarmed and perfectly legal civic organization whose stated objective, namely the liberation of Crimea from Russia’s occupation, was and remains in full accordance with the position of the UN and other international bodies. Unthwarted by the lack of any jurisdiction or grounds, Russia has not only claimed the Battalion to be ‘a terrorist organization’ but has used it as a weapon of political repression, especially against Ukrainian citizens abducted from territory occupied since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. It is telling that of the 50 cases which the Crimean Tatar Resource Centre had recorded, as of October 2024, 19 were against Crimean Tatars seized in occupied Crimea, while the other 31 were of Crimean Tatars or other Ukrainians from occupied parts of Kherson oblast.
The Memorial Support for Political Prisoners Project has just recognized two Crimean Tatar brothers, 25-year-old Oleksiy Settarov and Volodymyr Settarov (24) political prisoners. The two men were accused of involvement in the Noman Çelebicihan Battalion, with this treated as “participation in the activities of an unlawful armed formation acting on the territory of a foreign country for purposes which are against the interests of the Russian Federation” under Article 208 § 2 of Russia’s criminal code.
Oleksiy (b. 12.02.1999) and Volodymyr (13.12.2000) worked in agriculture in Crimea’s Rozdolne raion. Memorial calls Oleksiy Settarov a Russian citizen, and Volodymyr a Ukrainian, however it seems likely that this is merely how Russia treated them, while both men have Ukrainian citizenship. Oleksiy Settarov is married, with two small children, with this alone making it near impossible to live in occupied Crimea without taking a Russian passport. Volodymyr was only 22 and unmarried when taken prisoner.
In claiming, on 29 May 2023, that “border guards have detained two fighters of a Ukrainian nationalist battalion”, the Russian propaganda RIA Novosti also posted a video of the men’s ‘arrest’. The video is positively incriminating, with several heavily armed Russian enforcement officers in camouflage gear stopping their van in front of two young men quietly walking along a field. Having leapt out of the van and forced the terrified young men to the ground, the FSB then use blurred faces and a lot of noise to try to make this look like the ‘capture of criminals’. One of the men is asked if he is a member of the Noman Çelebicihan Battalion and he is heard saying ‘yes’.
Memorial can only assume that the men have been in custody since 29 May 2023. It is, however, possible that they were seized earlier, with Russia’s FSB standardly abducting people, holding them incommunicado, torturing and / or pressurizing them into providing ‘confessions’ before officially ‘detaining’ them. The prosecution claimed that the brothers had actively taken part in the activities of the Noman Çelebicihan Battalion from January to March 2019, and that their duties had been to guard a granary and agricultural equipment. It was asserted that they had been paid a salary, issued with jackets and allowed to work out in a sports hall. The two men had left in March 2019, however ‘the court’ chose to consider that they had not ended their involvement in the Battalion as they had not formally announced such termination to the FSB. The suggestion that any person would willingly turn up and provide Russia’s FSB with a pretext for persecuting them is nonsense, but, then, so is everything about these prosecutions.
As reported, the Battalion was founded at the beginning of January 2016 by Crimean Tatar activist and businessman Lenur Islyamov, with the first members people who had taken part in the civic blockade of occupied Crimea. This was initiated in September 2015 by Crimean Tatar leaders with specifically human rights demands, including Russia’s release of its ever-increasing number of Crimean political prisoners and an end to its crushing of freedom of speech. The Battalion had not existed for some time when, on 1 June 2022, Russia’s increasingly politicized supreme court allowed an application from the prosecutor general and labelled the Battalion a terrorist organization’. Over the same summer, just months after Russia’s full-scale invasion, that same ‘court’ labelled the Ukrainian Amed Forces’ Azov Regiment ‘terrorist’.
Both rulings were widely viewed as preparation for politically motivated ‘trials’ of prisoners of war and civilians abducted from newly occupied territory. With respect to the Azov Battalion, this has already happened
Russia has yet to bring ‘terrorism’ charges against those it abducts and prosecutes over alleged involvement in the Battalion, but it has massively increased the number of such abductions / arrests. Convictions in these politically motivated ‘trials’ are essentially guaranteed, with the only variable being the size of the sentence
Memorial points out that the two Settarov brothers were ‘tried’ separately, although the charges were essentially identical. Oleksiy Settarov was sentenced on 26 October 2023 to 5 years’ maximum-security (‘harsh-regime’) imprisonment, Volodymyr Settarov – on 22 November 2023 to 5.5 years, with both men to spend the first year in a prison, the worst of Russia’s penal institutions. While both men are reported to have ‘admitted guilt’ and testified against each other, it is worth bearing in mind that the young men are very likely to have been subjected to torture.
In declaring them political prisoners, Memorial stated that the mere fact of involvement in the Noman Çelebicihan Battalion did not constitute a crime. It points out that the Battalion was essentially a civic organization which was not taking part in any military activation. It cannot, in any case, be considered an illegal formation, with the proof of this lying in the fact that its members patrolled the administrative border together with Ukraine’s Border Guard Administration. “Furthermore, Russia’s interests are not contradicted by the activities of a Crimean Tatar association, but by the illegal seizure of Ukrainian territory”.
The following is adapted from the CTRC list. The links are to information about the political prisoner in English. All sentences are in maximum-security imprisonment.
Fevzi Sahandzhy, sentenced on 23 January 2019 to 10 years;
Dilyaver Gafarov sentenced on 23 August 2019 to 10 years;
Edem Kadyrov sentenced on 31 May 2019 to 4 years;
Aider Mamutov, sentenced on 22 April.2019
55-year-old Nariman Mezhmedinov, sentenced on 20 June 2020 to 8 years;
Medzit Ablyamitov sentenced on 24 March 2021 to 6 years;
Ibraim Asanov, detained on 17 January 2023;
Oleksiy and Volodymyr Settarov, seized on (or before) 29 May 2023
Two men from Sevastopol, detained on 25 January 2023 and on 2 February 2023
Three Crimean Tatar brothers – Artur, Arsen and Abliamed Memetshaev.
29-year-old Crimean detained on 13 March 2023
Two Crimean Tatars detained on 14 April 2023
A man arrested on 22 March 2024; on 11 June 2024 and on 14 August 2024;
A 54-year-old Crimean detained on 13 September 2024
Nariman Derman was sentenced to 3.5 years.
31 Crimean Tatars or other Ukrainians from Kherson oblast. They include:
Oleksiy Kiselyov, former commander of the Ukrainian Navy’s Slavutych Command Ship, who was abducted from his home in Henichesk and sentenced to 8.5 years
Nasrulla Seidaliev, seized on 4 March 2022
Rustem Gugurik seized on 31 March 2022, sentenced to 8.5 years;
Arsen Ibraimov seized on 9 April 2022, sentenced to 6.5 years;
25-year-old Ruslan Osmanov
31-year-old Ruslan Abdurakhmanov sentenced to five years;
Aider Umerov, abducted on 25 May 2022 from the Henichesk raion.
Mamed Dovhopolov abducted on 5 June 2022 from Kherson oblast)
Ihor Khalilov abucted on 21 July from the village of Salkovo in the Henichesk raion.
Kostiantyn Tereshchenko was arrested in June 2022 by Russian border guards and, reportedly, sentenced to 4 years and 3 months;
Akim Gafarov Occupation 'court' increases sentence against abducted Crimean Tatar for not admitting to fictitious ‘crime’
Khalil Kurtamet (whose son Appaz is also a political prisoner)
Hennadiy Osmak Fake Russian ‘court’ imprisons abducted Ukrainian journalist for membership of non-existent organization