"You can't accuse an entire nation of treason." May 18 marks the anniversary of the start of the deportation of Crimean Tatars.

May 18, 1944 - 82 years ago - from Crimea The mass expulsion of Crimean Tatars began. Stalin suspected an entire people who had lived in this territory for centuries of treason and effectively destroyed an entire culture. 

“You can’t accuse an entire nation of treason,” a member of Stalin’s Politburo would later write in his memoirs. AnastasMikoyanHowever, it was already too late. Mosques and cemeteries were destroyed, books were burned, and hundreds of Crimean Tatar names were erased from the map. Tens of thousands of people died en route and in exile from hunger, disease, and intolerable conditions. 

The Crimean Tatars were only allowed to return to their homeland in the late 1980s. But even then, the tragic chapter of their history was not over. Following Russia's annexation of Crimea in 2014, the Crimean Tatars were once again subjected to repression and persecution.  

On the anniversary of the deportation of the Crimean Tatars, we tell the story of a people whose homeland was twice taken away.