On 16 May, Russia’s Justice Ministry announced additions to the list of “foreign agents”, which now stretches to over 900 names. One of those added to the list is Lutfiye Zudieva, a Crimean Tatar activist who has been working to defend human rights for over 10 years and who remained in Crimea after it was annexed by Russia in 2014.
The status bars individuals from participating in many areas of public life — they may not teach, stand in elections, or even receive income from selling property. Yet Zudieva is resolved to continue her work on the peninsula.
The announcement of Zudieva’s status as a “foreign agent” came just two days before the commemoration of the mass deportation of Crimean Tatars to Uzbekistan in 1944.
Repression of Crimean Tatars has intensified ever since the Russian annexation of the peninsula.
Zudieva’s great-grandfather and his family were deported twice, first in the 1930s and then again in 1944, when the Crimean Tatar population was expelled from their homes on the peninsula, accused en masse of pro-German sympathies and collaboration.
“My great-grandfather was deported with his wife and children as a ‘traitor’. So you can say it’s a kind of generational continuity that has developed in the family. Now it’s my turn to live with some new label from the Russian authorities,” Zudieva said.
Following Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea, many Crimean Tatars felt forced into activism as they faced fresh repression. Crimean Tatars were aware very early on just what would happen to them if they chose not to recognise the newly installed Russian authorities when Crimean Tatar pro-Ukrainian activist Reshat Ametov was abducted and killed in March 2014.
Lutfiye Zudieva. Photo: Facebook
While some Crimean Tatars succumbed to fear and propaganda, many decided to fight the Russian annexation, beginning to defend themselves and their loved ones by studying Russian legislation and fighting back against criminal and civil charges.
Zudieva was in the maternity ward expecting her fourth child when the occupation of Crimea began. Despite still recovering from giving birth, she quickly began attending police searches and court hearings to support persecuted Crimean Tatars as an independent witness. Gradually, she turned to journalism and joined the Crimean Solidarity social movement, speaking out publicly against persecution and defending Crimean Tatars at trial.
After Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, persecution of Crimean Tatar activists only increased and Zudieva did not escape the crackdown unscathed.
Russian security forces have closely monitored Zudieva since 2018, especially around the anniversary of the deportation. In May 2018, the day before the commemoration, police officers arrived at Zudieva’s father’s house to ascertain if she would be taking part in any protest actions the following day. In 2019, Zudieva was detained and fined for demonstrating “extremist symbols” over pictures she reposted on Facebook with inscriptions in Arabic and Turkish.
Repression of Crimean Tatars has intensified ever since the Russian annexation of the peninsula. Since 2015, Crimean Tatars have been jailed en masse or charged for allegedly being members of the Islamist Hizb ut-Tahrir party, deemed a terrorist organisation by Russia. According to human rights organisation Political Prisoners Support Memorial, the successor to Nobel-prize winning organisation Memorial, over 400 people in Crimea have been charged with being part of a terrorist organisation in the past 11 years.
After Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, persecution of Crimean Tatar activists only increased and Zudieva did not escape the crackdown unscathed. In 2023, Zudieva was detained while outside a courthouse where she was working as a journalist, with a press pass in hand, and later fined. In February 2024, after security forces searched her house, she was detained and taken to Russia’s Centre for Combating Extremism, known as Centre E, an anti-extremism unit known for persecuting opposition activists.
Lutfiye Zudieva. Photo: Facebook
According to security forces, Zudieva was detained and fined for “abuse of freedom of speech” after she reposted on Facebook articles from media outlets deemed to be “foreign agents” without adding a mandatory warning at the top of the post informing readers about the source of the article.
In April 2024, Zudieva was fined again under the same charge for an article about a Crimean Tatar accused of being a member of Hizb ut-Tahrir.
Despite ongoing persecution, Zudieva has continued to speak out against Russia’s repression of Crimean Tatars and currently writes for various Ukrainian media outlets. In 2024, Zudieva received two Ukrainian journalistic awards.
Despite her new status, Zudieva has no intention of leaving Crimea or backing down.
Now, in 2025, the authorities have applied fresh pressure to Zudieva by declaring her a “foreign agent” just days before the anniversary of the deportation of her great-grandfather and other Crimean Tatars. Prior to the announcement, only one Crimean Tatar, Aider Muzhdabaev, who lives in mainland Ukraine, had been designated a “foreign agent”.
To Zudieva, persecution by the authorities is “nothing unexpected” given that she has chosen to “fight injustice and speak out against the arbitrary nature of the security forces”. As for her new status as a “foreign agent”, Zudieva admitted that she was “still a little confused about what this means” but said that she could “live with it”.
Despite her new status, Zudieva has no intention of leaving Crimea or backing down. Zudieva said: “I haven’t done anything illegal, all my work has always been aimed at protecting people in Crimea.”
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