The Russian war against Ukraine goes on. For the past year, the Russians have demonstrated that they are committed to killing everyone living in Ukraine. Muslims, Jews, Christians, no matter. As a colonial country, the Russians only aim to suppress as many people as possible and gain as many territories as possible. As we saw in 2022, there are no human values for them, only a drive for destruction in the absence of the ability to create.
Russians deliberately devastate cultural and religious places of people living in Ukraine. On March 12, the mosque of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent and his wife Roxolana (Hurrem Sultan) in Mariupol was shelled. On June 15, Russian troops destroyed the mosque and Muslim centre “Bismillah” in Sievierodonetsk. The same was done to mosques in Kostyantynivka, Donetsk region. These and many other holy places burned to the ground under Russian occupation in the past couple of months. It is a serious violation of human rights and international law. The intentional destruction of cultural heritage sites is considered a war crime by the International Criminal Court, and is condemned by the international community as a whole. Ukraine is a home to diverse ethnic and religious groups who live under the same humanistic values. The way Russians destroy this spiritual diversity of Ukraine by demolishing cultural and holy places is a sign of their ethical attitude towards non-Christians. There is a long history of that and many examples.
Russia has been known as a colonial empire that expanded its territory, particularly in the 18th and 19th centuries. It gained vast territories in Siberia, Central Asia, the Caucasus, and the Far East through military conquest and colonization. Many of the lands they occupied were inhabited by the Muslims. For example, the Muslims comprised a large part of the population in Siberia, mostly through the presence of Tatars. There was also a large Muslim population across the Volga–Ural and in the northern Caucasian regions. In the past, Russia also colonized whole independent Muslim states such as Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. The tactic was always the same — suppression, ethnic and religious cleansing, appropriation and further elimination.
In the war against Ukraine, Russia has mobilized the vast majority of the Muslim population from Siberia, Central Asia, and the Far East. Ethnic groups of Buryats, Komi, Tajiks have been sent to the battlefields in the East, South, and North of Ukraine. While ethnic Russians, especially those from better-off regions such as Moscow and St. Petersburg, overwhelmingly manage to avoid duty at the front. Russia’s peripheral subjects — Buryats, Dagestanis, Tuvans, Komi who are mostly Muslims — are Putin’s cannon fodder. Buryats are the second-highest number of soldiers killed in Ukraine since the start of the full-scale war — just after Dagestan, another conquest of the Russian Empire. As Russian casualties in Ukraine reach the hundreds of thousands, these inequities have become glaringly obvious. People in the periphery are becoming increasingly restless about sending their sons, brothers, and husbands to die in a war fought for the cause of Russia.
In Ukraine, the Muslim population inhabits mostly the Crimean Peninsula, annexed by Russia in 2014, and the South-East of the country. What is happening there now is the same what Russia (then the USSR) did during the WWII. In 1944, Crimean Tatars were forcibly deported from the Crimean Peninsula as a result of state-organized and forcible action, ordered by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. Deportation began on 18 May 1944 in all Crimean inhabited localities. More than 230,000 people were forcibly deported from their homes to the distant places in Russia. After the fall of the USSR, only over 200,000 Crimean Tatars returned to their homeland. The remaining Muslim population of the Crimean Peninsula was again suppressed under Russian occupation in 2014. Many were arrested based on their ethnicity and religion. Russians regard Muslims and especially Tatars as “unreliable elements” of society which need to be eliminated completely.
Apart from this, when first seizing the east of Ukraine in 2014, Russian forces shot Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17) on purpose. Several Russians were found guilty by the International Court of murdering all 298 people, including Malaysians, onboard flight MH17 by shooting it down. This case clearly shows that Russian colonial wars actually affect everyone. If Russia is not stopped right now, the world can expect only the worst.
The Russian colonial practices have expanded to practically the whole world, and there are even greater chances of further expansion. Muslim countries in the Middle East are especially vulnerable in this regard. Prosperous and with rich resources — whether natural, technical, or intellectual — such countries may fall into Russia’s “sphere of influence” which will mean colonization and further suppression.
If Ukraine wins, it will mean the end of the last empire, the end of colonial rule, and the end of unlawful territorial conquests. In this way, a massive cycle of total decolonization that started at the beginning of the 20th century will be completed. Empires want to survive but must be destroyed.
In this respect, all previous colonies should unite their efforts in this fight against the pure evil, Russia. There is a story of one man which can illustrate this appeal. A native of Palestine, Islam Dababseh came to Ukraine at the age of 17. Here he graduated from the university and became a doctor, got married, had children, acquired citizenship, opened his own business — founded a business group that manages two private clinics. Dababseh calls Ukraine his second homeland and admits that he is grateful to this country for the fact that he managed to realize himself here. That is why, after the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation on the territory of Ukraine, Professor Islam joined the territorial defence in the Kyiv region. It is only one example, but in the Ukrainian Armed Forces there are separate Muslim regiments. They came to fight for the independence of Ukraine because if Russia won’t be defeated now, it will colonize more territories and suppress more people.
