http://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/op_ed/44770
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Crimea is, for so many Ukrainians, a special place; a Black Sea Garden of Eden in which to unwind the knots of city life. Whether bathing on an idyllic Balaklavan beach, or perusing the pristine remains of Ancient Greece in Sevastopol, the peninsular seduces with its coquettish charm. Many have fallen under this spell over the ages: Greeks, Romans, Mongols, Russians and Ukrainians have all, at various times, staked their claim to Crimea.
The result of this imperialist seesaw is that today, now-Ukrainian Crimea boasts an ethnic diversity rarely observed on the mainland. One salient group is the Crimean Tatars, the history of whom is an intricate web spun beneath successive ruling powers. Their past will undoubtedly echo throughout eternity, but what of the present, and, of course, what of their future?
“Nothing ever happens without leaving a trace”, muses Imanov Rustim, Ethnographer at the Bakhchisaray Historical & Cultural Preserve and himself a Crimean Tatar, referring to the ‘Surgun’ – the Stalin-ordered 1944 deportation of the Crimean Tatars from their homeland to central Asiatic republics such as Uzbekistan. This event, according to Oleksa Haiworonski, Deputy Director of Science at the same preserve, “to a significant extent defines the modern make-up of Crimean society.” Crimean Tatars today account for circa 12 percent of the local population, a significant minority; the remainder being predominantly Russo-Ukrainian.
Yulia Tymoshenko, Ukrainian Prime Minister, recently marking the 65th anniversary of the Surgun, drew parallels between the deportation and the Holodomor – the man-made famine in Ukraine during Stalin’s tenure as Soviet leader: “This [is a] terrible and severe page in our history we, as Ukrainians who ourselves went through the famine-genocide…feel the sufferings and consequences of each and every Crimean Tatar.” The statement, though outwardly sympathetic, sequesters a significant delineation: them and us – ‘we’ are Ukrainians, ‘they’ are not.
Such sentiments are accentuated by what Oleksa Haiworonski terms “pro-Russian anti-Crimean Tatar propaganda” and have bred distrust amongst the various groups. On a recent trip to the peninsular, descriptions of ‘aggressive’ and ‘cocky’ Crimean Tatars were collated. These descriptions, according to Haiworonski, are unfounded: “Crimean Tatars are no more aggressive than the other peoples of Crimea, and Ministry of Internal Affairs statistics prove this”. Yet, the farther one travels from Crimea, the farther the innuendo spreads, one Kyiv resident reporting, “I think the Crimean Tatars are a brutal and cocky people…they are wild and aggressive.”
It appears that this ancient people, having endured the hardship of mass deportation now finds itself engulfed by majority attitudes molded by misinformation. The impact of Slavic cultural preponderance combined with the necessity of ‘making one’s way in the (Ukrainian) world’ is deleterious; Imanov Rustim lamenting that ‘the [Tatar] language – it is dying’. For all the obvious splendor of Crimean Tatar civilization – Aleksandr Pushkin penned the poem “The Fountain of Bakhchisaray,” so awed was he by the magnificence of the seat of the Crimean Khanate – it seems that, save the ubiquitous Chebureki – cheese-filled delicacies – Crimean Tatar heritage is in decline.
Heritage of course, for ethnic Ukrainians, is a revered element of life. At the recent Krayina Mriy (Country of Dreams) festival in Kyiv, fields of flowery embroidery stretched as far as the eye could see; when Ukraine’s countryside comes to town, the patriotism weaved into those caftans is palpable. Yelena Kaznetsova, a designer from Kyiv, explains the significance of cultural expressions “These symbols give strength to every individual and hence give strength to the nation”. Indeed, it is within these extrovert parades of ‘Ukrainianess’ that the populous’ feelings to the idea of Ukraine are observed: Ukraine is a good thing, something to be screamed from the rooftops.
Things, though, were not always this way. Yelena mentioned “All this [observing Ukrainian traditions] only really started 17 years ago; earlier people knew about them, but they were not especially publicized.” Previously, under the Soviet Union cultural homogeneity was purveyed; the very deportation of the Crimean Tatars could, justifiably, be considered symptomatic of this policy. Yet upon liberation of the Ukrainian national consciousness, a veritable explosion of cultural pride occurred which reverberates to the day. Yet does such benevolent patriotic exuberance exhibit facets of the very force that repressed it for so long? Is democratic, European multiculturalism-facing Ukraine intolerant to other cultures?
Article 138 of the Ukrainian Constitution ensures “the operation and development of the state language and national languages and cultures in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.” Though not explicitly mentioning the very existence of the Crimean Tatars, the sanctimony of the constitution does not appear to be practiced in reality. Tatar Crimean representation in state administrative bodies, according to Oleksa Haiworonski, is “much less than the general proportion of Crimean Tatars in the Crimean population.” With a subdued presence in the Ukrainian democratic process, it is little wonder why the Crimean Tatars recently felt compelled to resort to hunger-strikes in Kyiv to have their voice heard.
Yet, the victory won on an empty stomach could prove just as empty. Though the Crimean Tatars succeeded in their quest for land rights, the people living on that land are a far cry from their Khanate ancestors. Imanov Rustim explains “the people eschew their own traditions due to the process of civilization, considering them to be savage.” Indeed much of the beauty of Crimean Tatar civilization lives on only as exhibits in museums – unused and uncelebrated. The very survival of Crimean Tatar culture, according to Oleksa Haiworonski, rests “solely on the success of Ukrainian European integration.” For a country, therefore, that aspires to accession to the European Union, a substantial fillip to the process may be found in reversing this decline, and screaming from the rooftops ‘Ukraine is good; Ukraine is diverse!’
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