Press-conference How peaceful assemblies were extinguished on the eve of the “Crimean referendum” and what happened with their participants and organizers

(Kyiv) On December 9, 15.00, at Ukrainian Crisis Media Center, Euromaidan SOS initiative within the LetMyPeopleGo campaign will hold a press conference “How peaceful assemblies were extinguished on the eve of the “Crimean referendum” and what happened with their participants and organizers”. On the eve of International Human Rights Day, press conference speakers will remind that the oppression of freedom of belief, freedom of assembly and persecution of their members became formula to “success” at gunpoint in the Crimean referendum.
Crimean Tatars Ali Asanov and Mustafa Dehermendzhy are figures of the trumped-up February 26 case, whose names are being less and less mentioned after the separation from the case of Akhtem Chyihoz, the deputy head of the Crimean Tatar Majlis. Andriy Shchekun is a Crimean activist who was kidnapped and held captive for 11 days for attempting to organize a peaceful rally before Taras Shevchenko’s birthday in Simferopol. Euromaidan participant Mykola Shyptur came from Ivano-Frankivsk to support non-violent resistance to Russian occupation in Crimea and was arrested after a rally in Sevastopol. He has spent more than 1,5 years in prison. Through the examples of these Ukrainians, their relatives, human rights defenders and lawyers will talk about the all-out cleanup, which took place on the eve of the annexation of the peninsula, name its victims and tell what happens to them now. Ali Asanov’s wife, Elnara Asanova, will speak publicly for the first time.

Time: December 9, at 15:00.

Venue: Ukrainian Crisis Media Center (Ukrainian House on European Square, Khreschatyk str., 2).

Speakers:
Olexandra Matviychuk – Euromaidan SOS coordinator, initiator of the LetMyPeopleGo campaign,
Elnara Asanova – wife of February 26 case defendant Ali Asanov,
Bekir Dehermendzhy – father of February 26 case defendant Mustafa Dehermendzhy,
Andriy Shchekun – journalist, social activist and former hostage from Crimea,
Mykhailo Tarakhkalo – Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union lawyer, who works on Mykola Shyptur case.

For more information please contact Palina Brodik: +38 (091) 985 5353, ccl.org.ua@gmail.com