SIMFEROPOL, September 20. /TASS/. Active members of the Crimea Tatars community organised in Simferopol and Bakhchisaray protests against the food blockade of the peninsula, Crimea’s Deputy Prime Minister Ruslan Balbek told TASS on Sunday.
Young people organised a flashmob by the house of Ukraine’s legislator Mustafa Jamilev.
"Over a hundred people participated in it," he said. "They scanned Jemilev is traitor. The participants carried posters reading ‘Food blockade cannot make Crimea kneel,’ and the participants threw eggs into a man wearing a mask of the politician."
Another rally was by the SimCityTrans Company in Simferopol. The company is owned by initiator of Crimea’s transport blockade, owner of the ATR television channel, Lenur Islyamov. During the protest, the participants set on fire a U.S. flag.
"Crimean authorities do not support actions of the kind," the deputy prime minister told TASS. "But we can understand perfectly well the despair and the moods of our people. The anti-Crimean actions of Jamilev, Chubarov and Islyamov were the reason of that reaction from the Crimean Tatars. This is the form in which they expressed the attitude to those people."
On September 8, Jamilev, Chubarov and Islyamov told a news conference in Kiev about the food blockade they were preparing for Crimea. The Crimean border control of the Russian Security Service (FSB) reports trucks have not been allowed to cross the border from the Ukrainian side since 2a.m. on Sunday at the Chongar border crossing station. However, trucks continue crossing the border freely at the Chaplynka station.
Crimea’s head Sergei Aksenov told reporters on the same day "as usual, nationalists want to do something bad to the republic, but we are ready up to anything. There are big companies that are willing to ensure food supplies. Russia’s Federal State Reserve Agency (Rosreserve) is working as well. So, we will not have any problems no matter whether they will block us or not."
According to him, the Kerch ferry connecting the Crimean peninsula and mainland Russia now works in the ordinary course. "There are no long lines of trucks. The traffic volume may be fully redirected. We have no fear, we have been preparing for this for a long time," Aksyonov said.
He noted though that Crimea was interested in maintaining contacts between economic entities of the two countries. "We have always said that we do not want to disrupt ties between economic entities in Crimea and in Ukraine, many of which had three-or five-year contracts. Both residents of Crimea and Ukrainian citizens are interested in these ties," Crimea’s head said.