In typically heavy-handed measures on August 20, Russia used armed and often masked enforcement officers to prevent an entirely peaceful gathering dedicated to the thirtieth anniversary of important protests in Moscow in 1987 that alerted the world to the persecution Crimean Tatars were facing. The armed men proved capable only of moving the location of the meeting and were unable to stop a hard-hitting resolution warning of the clear similarities with Soviet persecution of Crimean Tatars and the very real danger faced now, under Russian occupation, to the right to self-determination of the main indigenous people of Crimea.
Russia's War Against Ukraine
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Halya Coynash: Russia deploys armed police but fails to stop vital Crimean Tatar resolution warning of persecution & discrimination
Armed men stand guard in front of the entrance of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people (the single highest executive-representative body of the Crimean Tatars) in Simferopol on September 16, 2014. Russian police on September 16 raided the assembly of pro-Kiev Crimean Tatars, activists told AFP, days after Crimean residents overwhelmingly backed pro-Kremlin parties in polls. Authorities also raided the homes of two Tatar activists in what the leader of the Tatar governing body, the Mejlis, called the start of "direct repressions" against the peninsula's pro-Kyiv community.
