RUSSIA RELIGION NEWS

Conflict over leadership of Crimean Muslims

MUFTI CALLS TATARS NOT TO ABANDON CRIMEA AT THE WHIM OF THE INITIATORS OF A BLOCKADE

RIA Novosti, 16 January 2016

 

The mufti of Crimea, Emirali Ablaev, called Crimean Tatars not to surrender to provocation and not to abandon the region for participation in the Noman Chelebijikhan armed volunteer battalion.

 

Earlier one of the initiators of a food and energy blockade of Crimea, Lenur Isliamov, reported the creation of the Noman Chelebijikhan volunteer battalion which will be concentrated on the border with Crimea in Kherson province of Ukraine, and already numbers 560 persons. Isliamov said that the task of the battalion is to preserve the borders of Crimea and "strike blows." At the same time he called Crimean Tatars to leave the peninsula and join the ranks of the battalion.

 

In her turn, the prosecutor of Crimea, Natalia Polkonskaia, declared that materials regarding the creation of an armed battalion in the south of Ukraine have already been delivered to the regional directorate of the Russian FSB for making a decision on the question of opening a criminal case.

 

"We cannot join those who call for the use of arms. To say nothing of calling for joining all kinds of illegal armed formations and battalions in Kherson province. While hiding behind our sacred religion, Islam. Blockades, blackmail, subversion, armed battalions, and other similar slurs all contradict the high moral principles of our religion and are haraam [i.e., prohibited by Islam—tr.]. We live in our motherland and nobody should think of leaving the land of our ancestors," Ablaev said at the opening of the Conference of Crimean Tatar Religious Leaders and Public Organizations "New challenges to the unity of the Muslim umma of Crimea."

 

The mufti said that the use of weapons leads only to destruction. "As a religious organization we categorically oppose the use of arms and force. Since the use of arms has never brought joy to anyone; on the contrary, only grief, tears, and the death of innocent people," the mufti stressed. (tr. by PDS, posted 18 January 2016)


MUFTI OF CRIMEA: ATTEMPTS TO SOW DISCORD AMONG MUSLIMS OF THE REGION

RIA Novosti, 16 January 2016

 

Emirali Ablaev, the mufti of Crimea, thinks that attempts are being made from the outside to divide the Crimean Tatar nation into traitors and supporters of diverse opinions and trends.

 

Earlier the leader of the unregistered organization "Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar nation," Ukrainian people's deputy Mustafa Dzhemilev, reported that in the near future in Ukraine an ecclesiastical board of Muslims of Crimea will be created, with its head office in Kiev. Dzhemilev emphasized that the muftiate functioning in Crimea "now does not reflect the aspirations and thoughts of Muslims."

 

"They are trying to divide our nation into traitors and supporters of diverse opinions and trends. Previously they tried to divide on religious grounds, introducing various kinds of radical sects. And what is most remarkable is all of this is being introduced from the outside, but we should reject these harmful actions and stick together," Ablaev said at the opening of the All-Crimean Conference of Crimean-Tatar Religious Leaders and Public Organizations "New Challenges to the Unity of the Muslim Umma of Crimea."

 

He noted that there cannot be even talk about the creation of some kind of Crimean muftiate outside the boundaries of Crimea. The mufti emphasized that the task of Crimean Muslims is to preserve their religion, language, and culture.

 

"I call everyone to unity in the resolution of current problems of the Crimean Tatar nation. If one follows the propaganda of various sects and schismatics, then we will wind up in an abyss and nothing will be able to preserve us as a nation," the mufti said.

 

Ablaev emphasized that attempts to split the unity of the Crimean Tatar nation are doomed to failure. We categorically oppose the use of religion in any political intrigues. Whoever ignites the flame of strife will burn in it himself," the mufti emphasized. (tr. by PDS, posted 18 January 2016)

 

 

MUFTIATE OF CRIMEA TO BE CREATED IN KIEV

Religiia v Ukraine, 15 January 2016

 

An ecclesiastical board of Muslims of Crimea will be created in Ukraine with its head office in Kiev, as a counter-weight to the currently existing one in Crimea, which was annexed by Russia, Religiia v Ukraine reports, with reference to RIA Novosti.

 

"Of course, it would be correct to create a muftiate there (in Kherson—ed.) but we decided that it would be more correct if it will be in Kiev. There may be its annex or imams in Kherson and in other provinces," declared Mustafa Dzhemilev, a deputy of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine and one of the most senior leaders of the Crimean Tatar national movement, in an interview with the QNA news agency.

 

He explains his decision by saying that people of the muftiate located in the peninsula "do not have either faith or religion" and that they have "other political aims."

 

At the same time, the famous Ukrainian eastern studies specialist and translator of the Quran into the Ukrainian language, Mikhail Yakubovich, shared in an interview with the website Krym.Realia his vision of the formation of a Crimean Tatar ecclesiastical board in Ukraine: "Formally Emirali Ablaev (the chairman of the Ecclesiastical Board of Muslims of Crimea—ed.) transferred the representation of the muftiate to the Ecclesiastical Board of Muslims of Ukraine "Umma," to Said Ismagilov, but the All-Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organizations refused to accept the new member. Of course, the question remains open of how to establish for Ukrainian Muslims relations with the former Ecclesiastical Board of Muslims of Crimea since it has already been integrated into the system of Russian Islam. Therefore the idea of a unique kind of 'ecclesiastical board of Muslims of Crimea in exile' seems realistic. It is another matter that, considering the already well-established division within Ukrainian Islam, comparatively few communities may join the new board." (tr. by PDS, posted 19 January 2016)

CRIMEAN MUSLIMS WORRIED ABOUT THREATS OF RADICALS AGAINST MUFTI ABLAEV

RIA Novosti, 16 January 2016

 

Muslim religious communities of Crimea are worried about threats that have derived from radicals in Ukraine with respect to the mufti of Crimean Muslims, Emirali Ablaev.

 

"Nowadays we are hearing from a neighbor state calls for armed actions among the civilian population of Crimea and we are seeing the formation of an anarchist battalion named for Mufti Shakhid Noman Chelebijikhan, who perished at the hands of anarchists in 1918. Moreover, the current anarchists are similar to the former ones since they are calling for the murder now of the current mufti of Crimea," a resolution adopted at the All-Crimean Conference of Crimean Tatar Religious Leaders and Public Organizations "New challenges to the unity of the Muslim umma of Crimea" says.

 

Representatives of 350 Crimean Muslim communities, 42 Crimean Tatar political and public associations, and the Crimean Tatar intelligentsia participated in the conference.

 

Muslim communities think that the glorious memory of Mufti Noman Chelebijikhan should be immortalized in the Crimean land and it should not be desecrated by those who today are calling for the killing of muftis.

 

Earlier one of the initiators of a food and energy blockade of Crimea, Lenuf Isliamov, reported the creation of the Noman Chelebijikhan volunteer battalion which will be concentrated on the border with Crimea in Kherson province of Ukraine and already numbers 560 persons. Isliamov said that the task of the battalion is to preserve the borders of Crime and "to strike blows." At the same time he called Crimean Tatars to abandon the peninsula and join the ranks of the battalion.

 

Crimean Prosecutor Natalia Poklonskaia declared that materials regarding the creation of the armed battalion in the south of Ukraine have already been delivered to the regional directorate of the Russian FSB for making a decision about opening a criminal case. (tr. by PDS, posted 18 January 2016)

 

CRIMEAN MUSLIM COMMUNITIES DECLARE SUPPORT FOR MUFTI ABAEV

RIA Novosti, 16 January 2016

 

Muslim religious communities of Crimea have declared their support for the mufti of Crimea, Emirali Ablaev, and they have condemned attempts to create an alternative muftiate in Ukraine.

 

Earlier the leader of the unregistered organization "Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar Nation," the Ukrainian people's deputy Mustafa Dzhemilev, reported that in the near future an ecclesiastical board of Muslims of Crimea will be created in Ukraine with its head office in Kiev. Dzhemilev emphasized that the muftiate functioning in Crimea "now does not reflect the aspirations and thoughts of Muslims."

 

"We support the mufti of Muslims of Crimea as the spiritual leader of the Crimean Tatar nation. The conference condemns attempts of individuals to set themselves up as judges over the mufti of Crimea. Such attempts are the heritage of the policies of state atheism of the recent past," says a resolution adopted at the All-Crimean Conference of Crimean Tatar Religious Leaders and Public Organizations "New challenges to the unity of the Muslim umma of Crimea."

 

Representatives of 350 Crimean Muslim communities, 42 Crimean Tatar political and public associations, and the Crimean Tatar intelligentsia are participating in the conference.

 

Public and religious leaders who gathered for the conference condemned attempts to create any alternatives to the Ecclesiastical Board of Muslims of Crimea both within Crimea as well as beyond its borders. "Such actions signify the spread of division of the Muslim community of Crimea and the Crimean Tatar nation, and they are condemned by Allah as grievous sins," the resolution says.

 

Muslim religious communities of Crimea also condemned calls to Crimean Tatars to go to Kherson province and join "armed formations for participation in a pseudo-jihad," which contradicts the interests of the Crimean Tatar nation. "We call Crimean Tatar youth not to abandon the land of their ancestors and not to join armed formations and not to surrender to pseudo-islamic calls. But on the contrary to live and create in the motherland, in peace and unity," the resolution says. (tr. by PDS, posted 18 January 2016)

 

MUSLIMS OF CRIMEA FORBIDDEN TO PARTICIPATE IN BATTALION IN UKRAINE

RIA Novosti, 16 January 2016

 

By a special fatwa, Muslim theologians of Crimea have forbidden Crimean Tatars to participate in an armed volunteer battalion in the south of Ukraine, Crimean vice-premier Ruslan Balbek told RIA Novosti.

 

He said that the pertinent fatwa—a legal position or decision on some social, political, or legal question—was formulated by the council on fatwas of the Ecclesiastical Board of Muslims of Crimea on 12 January.

 

The fatwa was publicly announced on Saturday by a deputy to the mufti of Muslims of Crimea, Aider Ismailov, during the All-Ukrainian Conference of Crimean Tatar Religious Leaders and Public Organizations "New challenges to the unity of the Muslim umma of Crimea."

 

"The fatwa says that participation in the illegal armed formation of the so-called Noman Chelebijikhan battalion is prohibited for Crimean Tatars and for Muslims of Crimea. This is not a recommendation; it is a religious legal decision," Balbek said.

 

He said that a council of scholars whose members include leading Islamic theologians, using examples of the Quran and Sunna, proved that the creation of a battalion does not have anything in common with "jihad," about which its organizers speak. "We see how the organizers of the battalion, like militants of IGIL (the Islamic State, a terrorist organization that is prohibited in the RF—ed. note), use the canons of Islam as a technique for manipulation. I am sure that Crimean Tatars have sufficient wisdom not to surrender to such provocations of the radicals of the mejlis," the Crimean vice-premier noted.

 

Earlier one of the initiators of a food and energy blockade of Crimea, Lenur Isliamov, reported about the creation of the Noman Chelebijikhan volunteer battalion which will be concentrated on the border with Crimea in Kherson province of Ukraine and already numbers 560 persons. Isliamov said that the task of the battalion is to fight for the return of Crimea to Ukraine. He urged Crimean Tatars to leave the peninsula and to join the ranks of the battalion. Crimean Prosecutor Natalia Poklonskaia said that materials about the creation of the armed battalion in the south of Ukraine have already been delivered to the FSB for deciding the issue about opening a criminal case. (tr. by PDS, posted 19 January 2016)


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