Speaking at a meeting of the presidential human rights council on Tuesday, Putin promised to address the issue taking into account all the peninsula’s ethnic minorities.
One of the council’s members, Yelena Masyuk, recalled the president’s decree, signed in April, to rehabilitate Crimea's Tatars and other ethnic minorities who suffered during Stalin's repressions. She expressed fears that only the Crimean Tatars would get help in reality while thousands of Germans, Armenians, Bulgarians, and Greeks would receive no support.
Putin said the issue will be considered in due course. “The problem is with budget restrictions,” he said, noting that there are moral obligations which should be fulfilled despite difficulties in budgeting.
The president added that information about people of various ethnicities living in Crimea would be more precise after a regional census, which started Tuesday on the peninsula and will last through to October 25. It is the first census after the republic of Crimea reunited with Russia in March this year.