According to a statement posted in the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine’s official website, the investigation into the 1944 "forced deportation of the Crimean Tatar people and other ethnic groups from the territory of the Crimean ASSR (Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic)" began in December 2015.
"This is not just an act of historic justice. What lies ahead is a search for the living executors of the criminal orders and bringing them to justice," Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko wrote on his Facebook page.
During the pretrial investigation the prosecution sent over a hundred information requests to state archives, universities and research libraries all over Ukraine. The authorities also questioned 63 witnesses and have identified over one thousand ‘potential victims.’
