Four Crimean Tatar Muslim women, already held for a year, are now being moved out of their homeland to a prison in Russia. According to the Crimean News Agency (QHA), the Southern District Military Court in Rostov-on-Don extended their detention by six months to March 28, 2027, at a closed preliminary hearing on October 9.
The Crimean Tatars are the indigenous Turkic Muslim people of the Black Sea peninsula, deported en masse by the Soviet authorities in 1944. Since Russia took control of Crimea in 2014, the community has again faced waves of arrests and prosecutions.
Who Are the Crimean Tatar Muslim Women?
Citing rights defender Lutfiye Zudiyeva, QHA named the defendants as Nasiba Saidova, 19, Esma Nimetullayeva, 40, Fevziye Osmanova, 22, and Elviza Aliyeva, 21. According to Turkish outlet Haber Nida, Russia’s FSB detained them on October 15, 2025, after raids on homes in villages of the Bakhchysarai district, accusing them of links to Hizb ut-Tahrir, which is banned in Russia. Esma is a mother of five and the wife of political prisoner Remzi Nimetullayev; Nasiba is the daughter of a well-known Crimean imam and worked at a nursery.
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Headscarf Torn, Transfer Ordered
QHA reported that in the first days of detention a female FSB officer barred Fevziye Osmanova from wearing a headscarf and tore it off in front of male officers, with Esma and Nasiba facing the same treatment. Following the ruling, the four will be transferred from the Simferopol (Akmescit) detention centre to Rostov. The next hearing is set for October 23.
Sources: QHA (Crimean News Agency), Haber Nida
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