Ukraine has evidence that Russian occupying forces are trying to find and mobilize men among the Crimean Tatar population in Russian-occupied Crimea for Russia's war against Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening address.
Zelensky’s representative to Russian-occupied Crimea Tamila Tasheva wrote on Facebook on Sept. 22 that Crimean Tatar men have received at least 1,000 mobilization notices on the peninsula.
Crimean Tatar men are being targeted for refusing to support Russia's occupation of the peninsula and its war in Ukraine, Tasheva said.
Tasheva also said that if "a few thousand Crimean Tatar men are killed or maimed in the war it will affect several future generations of Crimean Tatars," already at risk after facing forced deportations after World War II and repressions and exile after Russia invaded the peninsula in 2014.
"This is a deliberate attempt by Russia to destroy the Crimean Tatar people," Zelensky said.
