Russia’s ‘trial’ of Mustafa Dzhemilev was always going to be absurd. The world-renowned Crimean Tatar leader was banned by the Russian invaders from entering his homeland back in April 2014, and is now being tried in his enforced absence for having endeavored to return to his home in Simferopol on 3 May that year. If that were not surreal enough, a Russian-controlled court in Armyansk has ordered that Ervin Ibragimov be forcibly brought to the court to give testimony, four years after the Crimean Tatar activist was abducted by men in Russian road patrol uniform and disappeared without a trace. While we can only hope that Ervin will be brought to the next hearing on Dec. 3, it seems likely that these ‘summonses’ are the latest brutal cruelty to the young man’s parents.

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