Russia Targets Crimean Tatar Muslim Mother and Muslim Daughters for the First Time in Baseless Terror Arrests

News:

In a chilling escalation, the wife of a political prisoner and three other young women were detained in early-morning raids, marking the first mass arrest of women in Russia's ongoing "conveyor belt of repression."

There were, sadly, no surprises on 16 October, with the occupation ‘Kievsky district court’ in Simferopol ordering the detention of Esma Nimetulayeva (b. 1985); Elviza Alieva (b. 2005); Fevziye Osmanova (b. 2004); and Nasiba Saidova (b. 2006).  This was despite the fact that none of the four Crimean Tatar women is accused of any recognizable crime and that Esma Nimetulayeva, the wife of a political prisoner, has five young children.

Although there has been a sharp increase in the number of female political prisoners since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the mass operation on 15 October and its targeting of Crimean Tatar women was a very dangerous red line that Russia crossed for the first time.

Russia has now targeted women, including the wife of a political prisoner, Remzi Nimetullayev.  These ‘trials’ have already led to a huge number of Crimean Tatar children traumatized by armed ‘searches’ and forced to grow up without their fathers.  The message now is very clearly that they could be totally orphaned with nobody safe from persecution. https://khpg.org/1608815183

Comment:

Since the occupation of Crimea by Russia in 2014, the Kremlin regime has relentlessly persecuted Crimean Muslims.

Until now, this Godless regime and their "conveyor-belt" arrests on charges of involvement in Hizb ut Tahrir had exclusively targeted men, but we are now witnessing the first arrests against women accused of belonging to Hizb ut Tahrir in Crimea. These four women are Esma Nimetulayeva (39), a confectioner and mother of five; Elviza Alieva (19), a university student; Fevziye Osmanova (20), a shop worker; and Nasiba Saidova (18), a student-teacher and nursery worker.

Esma's 73-year-old mother, Aliye Bekirova, recounted the terror of the 4:00 a.m. raid, describing how she, her daughter, and five grandchildren were in the house at the time. “They entered suddenly, without knocking," the mother said. "My daughter said: ‘Don’t break it, I’ll open it myself’ – and immediately a whole group of heavily armed security forces entered; by my count more than ten, her grandson says there were at least fifteen.” After the arrival of the FSB units, the children were woken up by the noise and shouting, while the adults worried about their families. “The youngest is four and a half years old; in November she will be five,” the mother said, describing the grandchildren’s reactions to the events. The woman recalls that the security forces overturned things, checked every item in the children’s room, and even went through Islamic books. They did not let the oldest granddaughter, a schoolgirl, into the room when they read the warrant. Phones were partly confiscated, and the rest were returned.

During the raid, officers warned Aliye Bekirova to apply for official guardianship of her grandchildren, threatening that "if there’s no guardian, the state could take the children away." "I asked them: ‘Why are you doing this? You’re making children orphans while their parents are alive,’" "‘What have they done to you? They only practice their faith.’" According to her, Esma was taken away around seven o’clock in the morning. "Aren’t there enough security forces for one woman?” her mother later remarked.

The message, activists warn, is clear: Crimean Tatar children, already traumatized by armed searches and the arrest of their fathers, can now be made total orphans.

This is not the first time that Crimean Muslims have been persecuted by Russia. First it was tsarist Russia, then the Kremlin's communist regime, and now Putin's despotic regime. Today, the Muslimah dawah carriers in Crimea, reminds us of the position of the first Muslims in Mecca. Our sisters stand firm and tall with dignity like Sumayyah Bint Khayyat (ra), staring at the face of the brutal occupying Russian regime, relying only upon the promise of Allah as they continue to call for the revival of the Islamic way of life.

It is internationally known that Hizb ut Tahrir is not a terrorist organization, and all accusations directed against it by the Kremlin are pure lies and fabrications. By looking at the history of Hizb ut Tahrir since 1953 until now, it is possible to refute the lies easily. Hizb ut Tahrir adopts the intellectual struggle, the argument and the proof, and that Hizb ut Tahrir will not abandon this method. The Hizb will continue its intellectual and political work until Allah grants it victory and enables it to resume Islamic life under the Second Khilafah Rashidah (Rightly Guided Caliphate) on the method of the Prophethood—spreading Islam as a religion of mercy, justice, and tranquillity, so that nations enter it in crowds, escaping the oppression of capitalism and the tyranny of rulers, and so that people distinguish truth from falsehood.

Allah Almighty says:

[هُوَ الَّذِي أَرْسَلَ رَسُولَهُ بِالْهُدَى وَدِينِ الْحَقِّ لِيُظْهِرَهُ عَلَى الدِّينِ كُلِّهِ وَكَفَى بِاللَّهِ شَهِيدًا]

“It is He who sent His Messenger with guidance and the religion of truth to manifest it over all religion. And sufficient is Allah as Witness” [Al-Fath 48:28].

Written for the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir by
Tsuroyya Amal Yasna
Member of the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir