The U.S. called on the Kremlin to stop political persecutions of Crimean Tatars. Heather Nauert, the spokeswoman for the Department of the State posted this on Twitter.

On the behalf of this authority, she asked Russia to release the activists who protested against the occupation of the Ukrainian peninsula – specifically, Crimean Tatars Ruslan Zeitullayev, Rustem Vagitov, Nuri Primov and Ferat Seyfullayev.

In autumn 2016, they were charged with membership in Hizb-Ut Tahrir organization, which is banned in Russia as ‘extremist’. Lawyers of the detainees call the respective criminal case politically motivated.