Fwd: UNHCR Press Release: Crimean Tatars' citizenship
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From: MINELRES moderator <[email protected]>
Date: Wed, 30 Jun 1999 10:21:28 +0300 (EET DST)
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Subject: Fwd: UNHCR Press Release: Crimean Tatars' citizenship
From: MINELRES moderator <[email protected]>
Original sender: Eldar Zeynalov <[email protected]>
Fwd: UNHCR Press Release: Crimean Tatars' citizenship
-----Original Message-----
From: Fabienne Philippe <[email protected]>
Date: 22 June 1999
UNHCR Press Release
>From UNHCR NGO Unit
22 June 1999
UNHCR URGES 35,000 CRIMEAN TATARS TO APPLY FOR CITIZENSHIP BEFORE YEAR
END
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said
today some 35,000 Crimean Tatars banished from their homeland during a
Stalinist purge more than half a century ago stand to miss the chance
to acquire Ukrainian citizenship unless they renounce their current
Uzbek citizenship to take advantage of the simplified Ukrainian
procedures by the year-end. UNHCR has been sending mobile teams to
remote villages informing these people to request release from their
Uzbek citizenship and to apply for Ukranian citizenship before a 31
December deadline.
More than 400,000 Crimean Tatars were deported to Central Asia during
a purge of minorities Soviet leader Josef Stalin carried out in May
1944. At the end of the cold war era and the subsequent disintegration
of the Soviet Union, a quarter of a million returned to their
traditional homeland in Crimea, southern Ukraine. The rest of them
remained scattered in Central Asia, largely in Uzbekistan.
Of the returnees, 85,000 had been stateless or without access to
Ukrainian citizenship. Because of this, they faced problems settling
back in their native land, where they had no right to social and other
benefits. Since 1996 UNHCR has been working with the authorities and
counselling the returning Crimean Tatars on citizenship issues.
As a result, 50,000 have acquired Ukrainian citizenship to date. This
includes more than 25,000 people who had become stateless because they
returned between November 1991 and July 1992, thus falling in the
legal gap between the adoption of the new citizenship laws by then
newly independent Ukraine and Uzbekistan. Another 25,000 Crimean
Tatars have benefited from the Agreement on the Prevention of Dual
Citizenship signed by the Ukraine and Uzbek governments in August
1998, which allowed for an accelerated and simplified procedure for
renouncing Uzbek citizenship and acquiring Ukrainian citizenship. But
there still remain 35,000 people who must apply before the year end
deadline.
There are also an estimated 20,000 Crimean Tatars who have returned to
Ukraine from other countries of the Commonwealth of Independent
States. Many are facing practical difficulties in acquiring Ukrainian
citizenship. UNHCR continues to assist the Ukrainian government to
negotiate citizenship agreements with other countries, such as
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.
UNHCR protects and assists refugees and promotes respect for the 1951
Convention relating to the status of refugees. The reduction of
statelessness is also a mandated responsibility of UNHCR. The 1954
Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons and the 1961
Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness are the two main
international instruments intended to prevent and reduce the incidence
of statelessness. UNHCR has launched an accession campaign to
encourage all states to ratify the international instruments related
to refugees and stateless persons by the year 2000.
--
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