Tatars Seid Khalilov Medzhib and Avladi Memetov

The eldest village Morskoe-dwellers (the Crimea) - Tatars Seid Khalilov Medzhib and Avladi Memetov go on the meeting of the village-dwellers on Tuesday, October 31, 2000. On October 25, 2000 a group of Crimean Tatars cut off the 9-meters-height worship cross, made off the iron beam and fixed the day before on the hill Kamatra over the Morskoe village. On the next day the meeting of the Morskoe dwellers - both orthodox and Crimean Tatars- took place. A part of people were shocked at the vandalism of those who cut off the cross (local executive committee issued a permit on the cross fixing a year ago), the other part - at ignoring the opinion of the Muslim part of local population. On October 31 on the Extraordinary Open Session of the Agricultural Committee, in presence of 800 local dwellers, considered to postpone the final decision of the cross fixing till November 20. Ukrainian President is going to visit the Crimea in the early November and will personally find out all the problems of the Crimean Tatars and other deported nations (in particular, to allot areas to the Crimean Tatars). On the initiative of Archbishop of Simferopol and the Crimea Lazar many orthodox communities fixed the worship crosses in their villages for the 2000th Christmas. The most radical Crimean Tatars protest against it, motivating it by the fact that the Crimea- is the common house for all the nations and one religion should not prevail over another. Photo by UNIAN