Czechia’s Senate recognizes Soviet deportation of Crimean Tatars as genocide

The upper house of Czechia’s bicameral legislature on Dec. 18 officially recognized the 1944 mass deportation of Crimean Tatars as an act of genocide, according to the Ukrainian president’s representative office in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.

The Senate unanimously passed the resolution with 70 votes in favor and no opposition or abstentions. The Czech Republic is now the seventh country to condemn the Soviet government’s actions during this tragic event.

“This decision is a crucial step toward the international recognition of the 1944 deportation as genocide,” the statement said. “We express our gratitude to the Czech Senate and the Czech people for their solidarity and support.” 

The deportation, ordered by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, forcibly displaced nearly the entire Crimean Tartar population on the peninsula, uprooting more than 200,000 people from their homeland to remote regions of the Soviet Union.

“These actions were a deliberate attempt to erase the indigenous population, aiming to destroy their ethnic, cultural, and religious identity,” the presidential representative office said.

In 2015, Ukraine became the first nation to recognize the deportation as a genocidal crime. Since then, the parliaments of Latvia, Lithuania, Canada, Poland, Estonia, and now the Czech Republic, have followed suit.

“We call on the parliaments of other countries to support Ukraine and the Crimean Tatar people by joining the movement to recognize the 1944 deportation as genocide. Only through collective efforts can we restore historical justice,” the presidential office said.