Crimean prosecutor warns Tatar journalist over 'extremist' views

Radio Liberty reports that Lilia Budzhurova, deputy director of the Crimean Tatar channel ATR and a contributor to Agence France Presse, posted the warning from the Russia-annexed peninsula's authorities on Facebook on May 31. Budzhurova spoke out against the increasing arrests of Crimean Tatars and wrote an appeal for children of the detained. "Soon Crimean Tatars will be caught in the streets, on public transport, and at the markets. We're less than a step away from being forced to wear a yellow band on our sleeves, to differentiate us," she wrote on Facebook in April. She wrote last week that 18 Tatars had been jailed. "Most of those now in prison have children who are minors," she said, proposing the creation of a fund to support them. Crimean Tatars are a Turkic Muslim minority on the Black Sea peninsula that was annexed by Russia in March 2014. Widespread human rights violations there, especially of Crimean Tatars and Ukrainians, have been reported since.