‘Repel the enemy’: Crimean Tatars have become a key asset for Ukraine’s war effort
Submitted by Driss Rejichi on Fri, 06/26/2026 - 09:33
The Ukrainian Muslim minority has gained growing recognition in military, political and cultural spheres as it struggles to end Russia’s occupation of Crimea
Commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the deportation of the indigenous population of Crimea by the USSR, on Independence Square in Kiev, 18 May 2019 (Genya Savilov/AFP) Off On the edge of the Ukrainian capital, inside the Kyiv Islamic Cultural Centre, a handful of Crimean Tatars conclude their Friday prayer with the taslim greeting. Isa Akayev exits the masjid last.
Even though he has been retired since December, the 60-year-old veteran still proudly wears a shirt bearing the symbol of the Ukrainian Military Intelligence, along with his beard and taqiyah hat.
“War has changed a lot, the head-on assaults we were doing before, all of this is now impossible,” he told Middle East Eye, sitting on a traditional Crimean bench in the hallway of the Islamic centre, which also hosts the Religious Administration of Muslims of Crimea.
“Now, it’s mostly artillery and FPV drones doing the work. The kill zone can stretch up to 30 kilometres and you have to walk to avoid drawing attention.”
The battle-hardened Tatar reckons he is no longer suited to this high-intensity conflict.
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In 2014, as Russian soldiers occupied Crimea, Akayev founded the first Tatar unit fighting for Ukraine, the Crimea Battalion.
It sought to defend the interests of the Muslim indigenous community living in Crimea, more than 250,000 people at the time, most of whom had returned to the peninsula after decades of deportation under Soviet rule.
Since then, Crimean Tatars have continued fighting for their homeland, where Russia staged a referendum on annexation in March 2014. More than 96 percent voted in favour of the “republic” status given by Moscow, but the vote was declared illegal by the United Nations.
After the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by Russia in February 2022, “very visible Crimean Tatar units and soldiers” emerged in the Ukrainian military, explains Filiz Tutku Aydin, professor of political science at the Social Sciences University of Ankara.
This includes the Noman Celebicihan Battalion and the Grey Wolves squad, in addition to the historic Crimea Battalion.
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These units, as well as Crimean Tatars serving in the regular army, have fought on the front lines and paid a heavy price.
“There are announcements within the community when they died, that is, when they became shaheed [martyrs],” Aydin said, underlining the spiritual significance that the struggle for Crimea holds among them.
Crimean Tatars, veterans of war against Russia-backed separatists, take part in a memorial ceremony on Independence Square in Kiev on 18 May 2019 (Genya Savilov/AFP)
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Some Tatars have also risen to prominent positions, such as politician Rustem Umerov, a close adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who served as defence minister from September 2023 to July 2025.
“It was a total surprise,” Akayev said. The appointment carried a strong political meaning as Umerov became the first Crimean Tatar to serve as a minister.
If not always fighting on the front lines, the Crimean Tatar community living in mainland Ukraine also remains active in political and civic engagement. Now numbering 30,000 to 50,000 individuals, the Turkic ethnic group represents a visible minority among the roughly 30 million Ukrainians still living in the country, while more than 200,000 Tatars remain in Crimea, according to Russian statistics.
‘[…] as long as God gives me strength, I will continue to fight by every means permitted by Sharia for our homeland to return to us’
- Isa Akayev, founder of the Crimea Battalion
In 2023, the mainland Tatars created the platform “Crimean Front”, a structure bringing together businessmen, volunteers and organisations who all support the war effort.
“The goal was to remind the public that Crimean Tatars are also permanently contributing,” Lenur Mambetov, one of the founders of the Crimean Front, told MEE.
“We all have a common goal: not only to repel the enemy, but also gain back our territories and return home, to Crimea,” he added.
Russia's tightening grip on Crimea and growing repression on the peninsula since 2022 have made its liberation an even more urgent cause for the community.
“Ukraine’s victory is perhaps more important for Crimean Tatars than Ukrainians because as a depopulated nation, it is a matter of life-and-death for them,” Aydin said.
Keeping Crimea on the agenda
“Of more than 300 political prisoners in Crimea, the majority are Crimean Tatars, which underscores our community’s pro-Ukrainian stance,” said Akhtem Seitablayev, sitting in his office in Kyiv.
A prominent actor, screenwriter and director, Seitablayev heads the Crimean House, a state-funded cultural institution.
Its mission is “to provide cultural and educational services, particularly to people displaced from the occupied territories”, he told MEE.
Since joining the army in 2022, Seitablayev has continued to participate in cultural initiatives to raise awareness on the Crimean Tatar cause.
The hallways of the Crimean House are lined with posters from films about Crimea, including many movies Seitablayev was involved in.
Among them is Haytarma (2013), a historical drama depicting the May 1944 deportation of the Crimean Tatars.
One of the largest forced population transfers of the Soviet era, the “surgunlik” or “exile” saw over 190,000 people - overwhelmingly Tatars, with some Greeks, Armenians and other non‑Slavic groups added in June - deported by train to Asia in just three days, erasing the Tatar presence from the peninsula.
Commemoration of the 76th anniversary of the 1944 deportation of Crimea's Tatars by the USSR, on the Independence Square in Kiev on 18 May 2020 (Genya Savilov/AFP)
Many scholars describe the “surgunlik” as ethnic cleansing, while Crimean Tatars regard it as a genocide.
The deportation resulted in a high mortality rate, shattered Crimean Tatar culture and dispersed the community across a diaspora that never fully returned.
Like Akayev and Mambetov, Seitablayev was born in Uzbekistan, where most Crimean Tatars were moved. They returned to Crimea only as the USSR collapsed in 1991.
Haytarma is regularly screened at Ukrainian embassies ahead of 18 May, the deportation remembrance day.
Seitablayev attended one of the last screenings in Berlin, in May this year.
"After the beginning of the war in 2014, and especially after 2022, interest toward Crimean Tatar artists increased, and this cannot but please us," he said.
To promote their collective memory and narrative, Crimean Tatars also rely on a vast diaspora stretching from Central Asia to the United States.
‘Many viewed the Crimean Tatars returning from exile as a threat. Some politicians even claimed that we would seek to seize the peninsula or bring it under Turkish influence’
- Refat Chubarov, chairman of the Mejlis
The largest and most vocal community is found in Turkey, where hundreds of thousands settled during the Tzarist era before 1922, fleeing the persecution that followed the Russian conquest of Crimea in 1783.
Anatolia offered geographical proximity and a familiar cultural environment, as Turks and Crimean Tatars share closely related languages and traditions. The diaspora grew further in 2014, and then 2022.
“Turkey is a reliable partner because it has maintained the same position since 2014: support for Ukraine's territorial integrity and opposition to the occupation of Crimea,” Refat Chubarov, chairman of the Mejlis (assembly), told MEE.
As the representative body of the Crimean Tatar people, the Mejlis became an important diplomatic channel for Ukraine during wartime.
In April, Chubarov and several Mejlis members took part in the Antalya Diplomacy Forum, where they met with Turkish officials.
“We mainly discussed the issue of the persecution of Crimean Tatars in occupied Crimea, as well as support for Ukraine,” Chubarov said.
Mejlis chairman Refat Chubarov during an event in front of the Russian embassy in Kiev on 21 February 2022 in support of Tatars detained by Russia in Crimea (Genya Savilov/AFP)
Even though Ankara never provided direct military help, the Crimean Front maintains ties with Ankara since it started working in the humanitarian sphere.
“We also try to get help from other countries for our projects: Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE,” Mambetov said. Through the Crimean Front, Riyad provided assistance after the destruction of the Kakhovka dam in 2023, while the UAE supplied generators.
Crimean Tatars networks are also active beyond the Middle East.
“In Canada and across Europe, Crimean Tatar communities work closely with the Ukrainian diaspora,” Aydin noted.
“Ukraine does not fully take advantage of it, although things have improved,” he added.
The rapprochement itself is recent. For decades, relations between Ukrainian authorities and Crimean Tatars were partly shaped by mistrust.
A newfound prominence shaped by war
In April, Zelensky signed a decree aimed at safeguarding the identity of the Crimean Tatar people and recognising the legal status of the Mejlis.
The move was hailed as a milestone by the community, capping years of progress in the recognition of its rights.
‘Ukraine thinks integrating Crimean Tatars is necessary for re-integrating Crimea’
- Filiz Tutku Aydin, professor of political science in Ankara
According to Chubarov, even after 1991, decades of Soviet influence left Ukrainians see Russians as their “closest brothers” while mistrusting the Tatars.
“Many viewed the Crimean Tatars returning from exile as a threat,” Chubarov said. “Some politicians even claimed that we would seek to seize the peninsula or bring it under Turkish influence.”
Since then, relations have notably improved with Zelensky. In 2023, he established a new tradition of “official iftar” with Crimean Tatar representatives during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
“It was a shock, seeing the president give such importance to Muslims and Crimean Tatars was unprecedented,” Mambetov said.
The recognition of Crimean Tatar identity has now extended beyond politics to culture and history. In 2024, the president unveiled a memorial in Kyiv commemorating the “surgunlik”.
“Since 2014, perceptions of Crimean Tatar artists and culture have changed dramatically, for the better,” Seitablayev said. “To some extent, of course, the war helped in this. But I also believe it was part of the Almighty’s plan.”
According to Mambetov, many Ukrainians have also begun to challenge their prejudices about Islam. “People now have a better understanding of our religion,” Seitablayev said.
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The steps taken by Kyiv to guarantee the integration and autonomy of the community, now “ingrained in the legal structure”, has helped to build trust with the Crimean Tatar movement, Aydin told MEE.
“Ukraine thinks integrating Crimean Tatars is necessary for re-integrating Crimea,” he said, adding this stance effectively prevents any form of separatism.
As a result, the dual position of pursuing autonomy while respecting Ukraine’s territorial integrity “is not contradictory for the Crimean Tatars”, Aydin argued.
This is also the stance of the Mejlis and most leading figures of the community.
“Allah created it so that Crimea is part of Ukraine, how can we go against His will?” Akayev asked with a smile.
Although the idea of ceding Crimea to Russia has occasionally been floated as a possible basis for negotiations in the current war, including by US President Donald Trump, the veteran commander rejects it.
“I do not know what the future holds, but as long as God gives me strength, I will continue to fight by every means permitted by Sharia for our homeland to return to us,” Akayev said.
“Because the graves of my ancestors are there. Because I want to be buried there myself. Because without Crimea, there would be no Crimean Tatars.”
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