We, Members of the European Parliament, deplore strongly the fact that Ruslan Zeytullaev, a Crimean Tatar activist, a citizen of Ukraine, was sentenced to 12 years of imprisonment today, on 26 April 2017, by the Russian court in Rostov-on-Don.
In relation to this, we demand the Russian occupation authorities to guarantee free access of the Ukrainian consuls to Ruslan Zeytullaev and to transfer him to Ukraine. Given the fact that Ruslan was on hunger strike for three weeks we request to immediately provide him an independent medical examination and hospitalisation.
We condemn strongly all the illegal and unlawful repressions of the Russian occupation authorities against the Crimean Tatars who are persecuted under the false pretext of fighting against Islamic radicalism within the so-called Hizb-ut Tahir case.
Anna Fotyga, Petras Auštrevičius, Pavel Svoboda, Charles Tannock, Jaromír Štětina, Rebecca Harms,
Michał Boni, Ivan Štefanec, Antanas Guoga, Julie Ward, Tibor Szanyi
