THE AFTERMATHS OF THE OCCUPATION: A POLITICAL REPRESSIONS SYSTEM PART 3 Concurrently with the propaganda campaign, a hostile information background is created, when the Crimean Tatar people are indirectly blamed for all problems of the social life of the Crimean peninsula, whereby the image of the ‘enemy from within’ is created in the eyes of the population. In this connection, the cases of graf- R ti being drawn on the walls of private homes and places of worship of the Crimean Tatar people have become frequent, for example, with the following content: ‘Tatars 32 get out of Crimea’ . “Crimean Tatars are the natives of the peninsula. Due to speaking openly against the occupation of Crimea, they are now the most vulnerable group. De facto, the Crimean authorities have launched a systemic discrimina- tion against Crimean Tatars on racial, ethnic, and religious grounds. The scale and nature of the repressions have become a threat to the lives and security of Crimean Tatars. They include a series of abductions and disap- pearances, gangster attacks on the Crimean Tatar and Ukrainian civil so- ciety representatives, large-scale searches of homes, mosques, madrassas, libraries, and schools. Without exaggeration, with respect to Crimea and st Crimean Tatars once again, in the 21 century, the doctrine of the Rus- sian Empire, ‘Crimea without Crimean Tatars’, is being used and has been adopted for implementation by a UN member state, the Russian Federa- tion,” said the Chairman of the Mejlis, Refat Chubarov. 3.6. Repressions Against any Forms of an Independent Civil Society The occupation authorities perceive the existence of any uncontrollable public in- stitutions in any area of public life as a direct threat. Just a few of them are listed below: • Culture sector. Invitations for ‘preventive conversations’ with the management of Karman Art Center, which started in July 2014, were a vivid example. Karman Art Center is probably the only Crimean community center of contemporary culture, arts, and non-formal education. As a formal basis for such interest from the FSB, the case of the conR ned theater director Oleg Sentsov was used. It is impossible to identify the number of people from the cultural and other walks of life that were interrogated by the FSB in this case that is targeted at searching for potential members of the mythical ‘terrorist organization’ and are potentially under the threat of arrest for political reasons. Due to the real threat to her 32 http://old.kpunews.com/krim_topic7_9614.htm 51