CrimeaSOS: the new pre-trial detention centre in the village of Chonhar has been operating for about a month

As CrimeaSOS learned, the unofficial russian detention centre in the village of Chonhar in the occupied part of the Kherson region has been operating for about a month. 

CrimeaSOS received confirmation of information about the operation of the isolator. According to the available data, the occupiers partially transferred the victims of politically motivated persecution in Crimea from the pre-trial detention centre #2 of the city of Simferopol. In particular, those being accused within the “cases of the Noman Çelebicihan battalion”.

Information about the opening of an unofficial pre-trial detention centre in Chonhar was reported by the Crimean human rights group on June 5.

Since the beginning of the occupation of Crimea by russia, at least 18 persons have been sentenced for allegedly participating in the Noman Çelebicihan battalion. Four of them – in 2023.

We would like to remind you that the new pre-trial detention centre in Simferopol (#2) was opened in December 2022. For the most part, persons abducted from the Kherson region and charged under article 361 of the criminal code of the russian federation (an act of international terrorism) were placed there. 

The Noman Çelebicihan battalion is a voluntary Crimean Tatar armed formation, which was created in early 2016 during the blockade on the administrative border with the occupied Crimea. The battalion is named after Noman Çelebicihan, a Crimean Tatar politician and public figure, the first head of the government of the Crimean People’s Republic, the organizer of the First Qurultay of the Crimean Tatar people, the first Mufti of the Muslims of Crimea, Lithuania, Poland, and Belarus. On June 1, 2022, the supreme court of the russian federation recognized the “Crimean Tatar Volunteer Battalion named after Noman Çelebicihan” a terrorist organization.