Permalink : http://hdl.handle.net/2115/84239

In March 2014, a referendum on the status of Crimea took place, which was followed by Russia's official recognition of its result transferring the peninsula from Ukraine to Russia. Despite political scientists' interest in the Ukrainian crisis, there has been little attempt to probe the origins of the Crimean autonomy, which was restored and subsumed into the borders of an independent Ukraine in 1991. Taking the setting of the USSR's disintegration most seriously, this article examines the reinstatement of the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR), which was originally founded in 1921 with Crimean Tatars as a central nationality but then abolished and turned into a province (oblast') in 1946. Although scholars have paid attention to the bilateral relationship between Russia and Ukraine and the contribution of the local Russian-speaking population to the restoration process, the role of the Crimean Tatars tends to be underrated. By closely tracking the path to the reinstatement of autonomy, I contend that the Crimean Tatar returnees from the Stalinist deportation in 1944 do indeed matter in this political course. First of all, this article traces the activities of the Organization of the Crimean Tatar National Movement (OKND) as well as the Soviet government's committee dealing with the rehabilitation of the Crimean Tatars and their repatriation to the Crimea. I clarify that an early sign of the reestablishment of an autonomous republic in Crimea emanated from the USSR Supreme Soviet, which recognized the Crimean Tatars' right to return home. Secondly, focusing on Crimean internal politics, I address the role of Nikolai Vasil'evich Bahrov, chairman of the Soviet council in Crimea Oblast', who, based on support from the USSR Supreme Soviet, elaborated a plan for the reinstatement of the autonomous republic and took the initiative for its materialization. Invoking the Crimean Tatars' right of repatriation as a rationale for the recreation of the autonomous republic, Bahrov negotiated his plan with Leonid Makarovich Kravchuk, chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR. As a result, while it was the OKND's activism that led the central, Ukrainian, and Crimean governments to put the possibility of an autonomous republic on the agenda, a multi-ethnic autonomy as opposed to the OKND's demand for the Crimean Tatars' mono-ethnic autonomy emerged in January 1991. I also examine the place of the new Crimean autonomy amid Ukraine's move from a Soviet republic to an independent state. In Crimea, the confrontation between Bahrov and the OKND heightened. The OKND insisted that the Crimean Tatars' repatriation should mean their exclusive sovereignty in the autonomous republic and that therefore only they, as Crimea's core ethnic group, should be eligible to use all resources in the peninsula. Bahrov's and Kravchuk's dismissal of such an extreme position made the OKND marginal in Crimean politics. It was right after Ukraine's declaration of independence, however, that Russia and Ukraine fell into tensions over Crimea's belonging, which could have brought the peninsula back to Russia as before 1954, when it had been passed to Ukraine. While Bahrov implied Crimea's possible move to Russia but thought it necessary to discuss its status with both Russia and Ukraine, Kravchuk tried to persuade the local population to stay with Ukraine by promising an overall development of the autonomous republic. In the end, Crimea did not leave the independent Ukraine but remained within its borders until 2014. Thus, the Crimean Tatar returnees and OKND's activism did serve as a spur to intensify negotiations over the reinstatement of the autonomous republic among the USSR, Ukrainian, and Crimean authorities. But the OKND's radical statements prevented Bahrov and Kravchuk from taking their insistence on a mono-ethnic sovereignty seriously. As a result, a multi-ethnic autonomy took shape in contrast to the original Crimean autonomy of 1921.