About two hundred children need protection right now. Mumine Saliyeva, a Crimean Tatar and the wife of a prisoner involved in the second Bakhchisaray Hizb ut-Tahrir case, is the coordinator of the Crimean Childhood civic initiative.

The initiative was formed in 2018, but work with children left without a father has begun with the first arrests on the peninsula.

The editorial office of the Suspilne Crimea spoke with Mumine about how the fathers’ arrest affected the children’s psyche. These are actual stories about the experiences of the youngest and most vulnerable witnesses to arrests in Crimea.

Children’s injuries have been going on since the beginning of the arrests on the peninsula. Beginning with the Sevastopol Hizb ut-Tahrir case, the children of those involved in the “case” felt the psychological consequences of their parents’ arrests.

A psychologist worked with the daughters of one of those arrested in the case, and later sentenced to 15 years in a maximum-security prison, Ruslan Zeitulayev.

After the appearance of Russian security officers in their house and the arrest of the father, the children closed themselves up and refused to communicate with people.

“They stopped communicating as if they had a personal world of their own. Years have passed to adapt them to completely new conditions: when the father is not at home and the mother is almost not at home, because she is constantly busy with collecting documents, visiting lawyers, etc. Fortunately, now, the girls got over it. For example, in the situation with the eldest daughter of the arrested human rights activist Server Mustafayev, Dzhemile, she became afraid to stay alone in the room. The girl panics when she sees people in camouflage”, - Mumine Salieva said.

Mumine says that after searches in July 2020, the three daughters of religious figure Ismet Ibragimov were frightened by Russian security forces.

“These daughters, during the search, when they saw security officers with weapons, they turned pale and, according to their mother, they stood for thirty seconds like frozen statues. After that, the girls developed certain health problems. Medical reports state that all gained health problems are psychological, because of the stress”, - she said.

The Zeytullaev family

Sons of Server Mustafayev, for example, are constantly building prisons out of LEGOs, from which they free their father in the game. Emil Dzhemadenov’s sons lock themselves in a room or any other building and say that they are behind bars like their father.

The Crimean Childhood Coordinator divides the consequences of the events experienced by the children after the arrests of their fathers into three conditional aspects.

This is acquired stress, which manifests itself in various forms, such as forms of uncontrolled crying, sleep disturbances, isolation from society, and frequent fear.

This is unusual behaviour for children: irritability, drawing bars, and prisons, and so on. The third aspect: medical disorders after gaining stress. Some children of political prisoners gained such diseases as chronic enuresis, constant fever, autoimmune diseases, worsening of symptoms of diseases that had been established in children before (for ethical reasons, the editorial office does not name children with diseases - ed.)

The Mustafaev family

They are afraid that the police will take away their mother as well.

Mumine raises four children on her own: three daughters and a son. Her husband, Seyran Saliyev, was arrested in October 2017.

The woman says that with the beginning of the first searches, she and her husband always prepared the children for the fact that the father could be arrested.

“That day affected my child’s health. When we analyzed the reasons, the psychologist explained that during the search, she was badly hit by security officers. I’m not saying it was intentional. When they broke into our house, she stood behind Seyran, and the daughter was blown away by a forceful wave. This situation affected her. After the arrest of her father, my child is terrified that such a day will come again. And next time they will come for me”, - she said.

When Mumine describes her typical day, she smiles and notes that the morning does not start with coffee.

“My morning starts with urgent calls, someone needs to make an appointment for an ultrasound, someone needs help with educational issues. If there is a question of more serious health problems, then we find the contacts and promptly work out this issue. Now it is the end of the school year, and I summarize the statistics, how many excellent students we have. We describe the abilities and capabilities of each child separately so that in the future, to help mothers choose educational institutions, so as not to lose the moment when children would like to develop some of their creative abilities, and so on. And here in all this work, our people are always around. It is certainly impossible to say that these children are left to fend for themselves. People help and react to any problem quickly", - Salieva says.