SIMFEROPOL (Sputnik) — The Russian Justice Ministry suspended Mejlis, a minority ethnic Tatar organization, after it was accused of links to terror groups like Hizb ut-Tahrir and Turkey’s neo-nazi Gray Wolves. Washington said the decision contravened basic democratic principle.
"If the US State Department thinks it is important to keep an organization like Crimean Tatars’ Mejlis and they deem its activities 'democratic' they are free to create such an organization at home," Poklonskaya told RIA Novosti.
Crimea rejoined Russia after a referendum in March 2014, in which 96 percent of people in the region backed cessation from Ukraine. The United States imposed a range of individual and sectoral sanctions on Russia and its officials in the wake of the vote, including on Poklonskaya.
