To return Crimea with people. What to do with a peninsula after de -occupation

Half a year ago, immediately after the liberation of the Kherson region, I received a message from a friend from Crimea, who asked what would happen when the Armed Forces of Ukraine would enter the peninsula. "Will they consider me a collaborator and hold me accountable?" She asked. For a 34-year-old woman, a single mother who manages a small business was a vital issue.

I replied that she should not worry because she did not cooperate with the Russian authorities and is a victim of illegal annexation and all its consequences. But her anxiety gets to me. How many people on the peninsula are worried about the liberation of Crimea, but are afraid of its consequences? They want it because they will finally be free. They are scared because they do not know what it may mean for them after nine years of occupation.

This fear arose in many respects because of Russian propaganda, which systematically works in the occupied territories to demonize Ukrainians and their armed forces. Not all are resistant to such misinformation or can check these narratives in other media. Ukraine adopted its first strategy for the de -occupation of Crimea in March 2021 with 97 steps before the release of the peninsula. In April 2023, this plan was updated.

It was an important signal that Kiev is aimed at the liberation of Crimea and has a strategy. For international partners, it also signals that Ukraine not only wants help and assistance, but also actively works on its mission. One of the practical steps of the strategy is to provide public services to residents of Crimea when Ukraine returns control.

"At the beginning of 2014, there were more than 16 thousand civil servants in Crimea, more than 12 thousand police officers, almost 3,000 SES employees, about 1. 5 thousand SES employees and as many prosecutors - more than 30,000 people," he said, "he said Permanent representative of the President of Ukraine to Tamil Tashev.

"At first, we do not need so much, but we are still talking about thousands of people, and we are getting ready for it in various fields," she said in answers to questions through e -mail. "The Cabinet has agreed to form a personnel reserve for de -economic territories, and the National Service Agency prepares short -term training courses for them.

" This year, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv will start recruiting for master's programs dedicated to government in the post -war territories. The programs will include various aspects of management, security, socio-cultural issues and economics. "Two months ago, the online course" Prome "was launched, and almost 15,000 people have received a basic education about Crimea, its history, culture and features of the region," Tasheva said.

The course, designed for Ukrainian civil servants and employees of local self -government bodies, consists of 10 lectures on the history of the peninsula, the life of the Crimeans under occupation, transition justice and the strategy of de -occupation and reintegration. The issues of utilities in the Crimea and cooperation with the Russian occupation go side by side and are discussed in detail in Ukraine and abroad.

Can those left in Crimea continue to work as teachers, doctors or other civil servants after restoring control over Ukraine? In March 2022, just a few days after the full -scale Russian invasion, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine adopted a law that supplements the Criminal Code with a new article on criminal liability for collaboration.

Voluntary occupation of a position in the occupying power, propaganda in educational institutions or transfer of material means to illegal armed or paramilitary formation in the occupied territory is now punished by penalties, imprisonment and confiscation of property. The convicted person will also be forbidden to occupy certain positions or engage in certain activities for 15 years. By April 2023, about 5,000 criminal cases were opened for collaboration.

Higher officials and war criminals will be imprisoned, and lower -level people will be limited in their activities, Tasheva said. "Medium and lower civil servants, whose actions have caused grave consequences, will be held accountable and criminal responsibility, those whose actions have not caused serious consequences will no longer be able to work in the civil service," she wrote. .

Legislation against collaboration has sent a very clear signal to the newly -mentioned territories: their inhabitants should not cooperate with Russian troops, and if they do it, they will be held accountable. But it looks quite different in the territories that have been occupied for nine years. "A month or two, talking about what to change, decriminalize a certain activity," says Alona Lunova's PC Director.

She believes that the law goes too far: "We criminalized the work of all teachers of annexed Crimea and occupied Donetsk and Lugansk regions. Because what standards do they introduce there? Educational standards of the Russian Federation. "At the same time, it is very important to have a vision of how local personnel, indigenous residents of Crimea can be involved in the recovery , - said Lunova. "Of course, you need to establish how and where they worked before.

If he is a specialist who worked in Crimea with the appeals of residents or with social assistance at birth, with retraining, they could work in the restored administrations of Ukraine. Why not? Form and how long the threat will continue from Russia - and we can conclude that it will be a long -term threat, "he said. ] During the occupation, they would be left without consequences when we resumed control, "he said.

" Relations with these people should be based on long -term danger to Ukraine by the Russian Federation. "Both the Ukrainian authorities and human rights activists clearly understand that the citizens of who have moved to Crimea after annexation will have to return to Russia. They have fallen into the territory of Ukraine illegally and therefore have no right to reside.

Less clarity regarding Russian citizens who legally resided in Crimea before annexation and those who created a family (created families ( For example, those who marry the Crimeans) are continuing discussions on this topic. Those to whom Russia has forcibly issued passports, power in Kiev does not accept as citizens of Russia. These are citizens of Ukraine who have suffered from the occupation, - the government noted. "The message to our inhabitants in Crimea is simple.