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Crimea and Sevastopol

Crimea Movement, not Majlis, represent interests of Crimean Tatars - envoy

He called an act of terror the explosions at the electricity grid line in Ukraine, which supplied the energy to Crimea

Mejilis leaders Mustafa Dzhemilev and Refat Chubarov ITAR-TASS/Maxim Nikitin

Mejilis leaders Mustafa Dzhemilev and Refat Chubarov

© ITAR-TASS/Maxim Nikitin

SIMFEROPOL, December 19. /TASS/. The Majlis of Crimean Tatars, which is not registered in Russia, does not represent any longer interests of the people. It has been substituted in Crimea with the Crimea inter-regional civil movement, envoy of the Russian president to the Crimean Federal District Oleg Belaventsev said at the opening of the movement’s second congress on Saturday.

"Former leaders of the Majlis - Dzhemilev, Chubarov and Islyamov - have lost contacts with the people, they became criminals and terrorists," the envoy said.

He called an act of terror the explosions at the electricity grid line in Ukraine, which supplied the energy to Crimea.

Read also

Massive power blackout in Crimea

"This act of terror has affected the people in Crimea, including the Crimean Tatars," he said.

While commenting on a recent meeting between Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Ukraine’s MP Mustafa Dzhemilev, he said former leaders of the Crimean Majlis "are using the name of the Crimean Tatars." "Today, those false leaders want to make terrorists of the Crimean Tatars, announcing organisation of Crimean-Tatar and Muslim battalions in Ukraine. They are trying to use the name of their ethnicity and to unleash a massacre conflict in Crimea. For fighting who? Their own people?"

On Friday, Turkish Anadolu news agency reported Dzhemilev had a meeting with Erdogan. During the meeting, they discussed among other issues organisation in Ukraine at the border with Crimea of an armed division to be controlled by the Majlis. No details were available on objectives the division will have.

Crimean authorities claim Deputy Dzhemilev and his allies - deputy Refat Chubarov and Crimea’s former Deputy Prime Minister Lenur Islyamov are organisers of the explosions which caused the blackout in Crimea in early hours of November 22. Criminal proceedings among them are under way.

The Crimea Movement, which has united major organisations of Crimean Tatars, was formed a year earlier as an alternative to the Majlis, which leaders had refused to re-register it in compliance with the Russian legislation.

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Crimea and Sevastopol

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