The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine expresses its strong protest in connection with the so-called decision of the prosecutor’s office acting in the temporarily occupied territory of the Crimea to suspend the activities of Mejlis.

This decision has become another link in the chain of crimes commited by the Russian occupying authorities against the representatives of the Crimean Tatar people, which are the indigenous people of Crimea. We consider this act as a failure to comply with the binding international obligations on behalf of the occupying State, as well as the violation of Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination committed by the latter.

Over the past two years, the Kremlin has turned the Ukrainian peninsula in the area of harassment, intimidation and persecution, mass violations of fundamental human rights and freedoms.

Against this background, charging Mejlis with carrying out extremist activities looks especially cynical.

Despite strong condemnation of Russian aggression against Ukraine and of the occupation of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol expressed by Ukraine and world democracies, the Kremlin with all its aggressive actions against Ukraine continues to openly despise international law and the just demands of the entire civilized world.

Ukraine calls upon all democratic countries to demand from the occupying state state to immediately stop massive violations of fundamental human rights and freedoms on the peninsula; to provide access to the temporarily occupied Autonomous Republic of Crimea for the international organizations in order to carry out continuous monitoring of the human rights situation; combine efforts aimed at the de-occupation of the Crimea.