A Russian Orthodox church in the Tatar town of Bakhchisaray.
Tatars have lived in Crimea for centuries but in 1944 Stalin punished the entire tatar population for collaboration wth the German occupiers by deporting them to Uzbekistan and other parts of the former Soviet Union, despite the fact that many of them fought in the Red Army. The Tatars were only permitted to return to Crimea in the late 1980s at which point they were given land which nobody else wanted. Many Tatars fear that they will be second class citizens again if Crimea joins Russia.