FSB tries to break into office of lawyers who defend Crimean Tatars

In the occupied Crimea, in Simferopol city, the unknown were trying to break into the bar association office, which lawyers  protect the rights of the Crimean Tatars persecuted by the Russian Federal Security Service.

Lawyer Emil Kurbedinov posted this on Facebook.

“At the moment, the unknown persons, obviously the security service officers, are trying to break into the bar association office in the Vorovsky Street, where I work,” he wrote at about 12:00.

According to him, in Simferopol the unknown are trying to break into the office, where there are lawyers’ records and technical equipment with legally privileged and confidential information.

At the same time, journalist Anton Naumlyuk informed that the unknown left the building.

“Assistants quickly left the office, closed it and went away. Lawyers are planning to file a police report,” he wrote.

“Eyewitness states that the unknown are the Russian Federal Security Service officers. The lawyers reckon two variants: the officers were trying to break into the office in order to get the documents on the case of ‘Hizb ut-Tahrir’ and ‘case of February 26’; or it was a rather strange attempt to ‘invite’ Kurbedinov into the Kyiv District Court on Siruk’s complaint proceeding, scheduled for 2:00 p.m.,” Naumlyuk wrote.

As reported, on August 2 the North Caucasus District Military court in Rostov-on-Don held another court hearing on ‘the case of Crimean Muslims’ – Ruslan Zeytulaev, Rustem Viitov, Nuri Primov and Ferat Saifullaev, who are accused of involvement in the activity of ‘Hizb ut-Tahrir’.

The Crimean Tatars were arrested in winter 2015 in Sevastopol. In May, the custody term was extended until October.

Representatives of the ‘Hizb ut-Tahrir’ international Islamic political organization call its mission to unite all the Muslim countries into Islamic Kalifate.

They reject terrorist methods to achieve this mission and say that they suffer unreasonable persecution in Russia.

In 2003, the Russian Supreme Court has banned ‘Hizb ut-Tahrir’, putting it on the list of “terrorist” associations.