The Formation and Legal Status of the Crimean Democratic Republic (late 1917 – early 1918)

The article analyzes the events preceding the establishment of the Crimean Democratic Republic in 1917 and characterizes its legal status. The author establishes that the territory of Crimea was the core of the Crimean Khanate, which was annexed by the russian Empire in 1783 in violation of the Kyuchuk-Kainarji Peace Treaty. The century of the russian Empire’s domination of Crimea remains in history as the “black century”, which led to the depressed state of the Crimean Tatar people, which objectively raised the task of its social and national liberation, accelerating the process of transformation into a modern nation. It is established that in the 1880s the process of Crimean Tatar revival, i.e. the formation of a modern ethnonation, began. The impetus for this process was the creation of the first printed edition of the Crimean Tatar people, the enlightened public newspaper Terdzhiman in 1883. The next significant event in the struggle of the Crimean Tatar people for their independence was the creation of the organization “Vatan” in 1908 by Noman Çelebijihan. Based on the analysis of scientific publications, the author establishes that the national liberation movement in Crimea was the equivalent of the Ukrainian National Congress in April 1917. In particular, in 1917, several processes took place in Crimea: the democratic revolution, ukrainianization and the revival of Crimean Tatar national statehood. In December, the First Kurultai decided to establish the Crimean Tatar Democratic Republic and form the Crimean Tatar national government. The first democratic constitution of the Crimean Tatar people was created, which declared the principles of separation of powers, equality of all citizens before the law, freedom of religion, etc. However, in January 1918, the Bolshevik army seized the territory of the peninsula and began the Red Terror, which resulted in the termination of the Crimean Democratic Republic.