UWC HONORS VICTIMS OF THE CRIMEAN TATAR GENOCIDE, CALLS FOR DE-OCCUPATION OF CRIMEA AND OTHER PARTS OF UKRAINE

The Ukrainian World Congress (UWC) together with the multi-million strong Ukrainian diaspora joins Crimean Tatars around the world in commemorating the anniversary of the deportation of the Crimean Tatar population from Crimea and in solidarity against centuries of Russian brutality and aggression.

The deportation of Crimean Tatars 78 years ago was one of the most horrific ethnic cleansings in Soviet history. Almost 200,000 were deported to eastern work camps, up to 40% of them died as a result. The surviving Crimean Tatar population was forced to live in harsh exile conditions through the late 1980s, humiliated and labeled by the Soviet authorities as traitors and fascists.

The return to their ancient homeland Crimea became possible only after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the restoration of Ukraine’s independence in 1991. Ukraine officially recognized May 18 as a day to remember genocide against Crimean Tatars.

With the Russian take-over of Crimea in 2014, Crimean Tatars were again under repression in their ancient homeland. The Russian Federation brought back terror, intimidation and persecution of members of the Crimean Tatar and Ukrainian communities based on political, cultural and religious intolerance.

Since the launch of a full-scale invasion in February 2022, Russia is again committing the worst kind of atrocities, war crimes and meaningless destruction.

Over one million people of Ukraine have been forcibly taken to “labor camps” in remote regions of the Russian Federation, their documents confiscated, identities erased.

The Ukrainian World Congress calls upon governments and international organizations to recognize the deportation of the Crimean Tatar people in 1944 as genocide. We also call upon the international community to put the utmost pressure on Russia through sanctions and support the Ukrainian government’s Crimean platform initiative, to accelerate the de-occupation of Crimea.

Finally, we call upon the international community to secure a continuous flow of heavy weaponry to Ukraine to put a final end to the Russian reign of terror and achieve full de-occupation of Ukrainian soil.

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UWC joins the Facebook storm of the Crimean Tatar Resource Center, to show the whole world the crimes of the Russian Federation against humanity, which are becoming systemic. In 1944, they carried out the genocide of the Crimean Tatar people, and today they are doing the same with the Ukrainian people. We must stop this.