A group of 11 deputies of the European Parliament condemned the arrest of the Crimean Tatar Ruslan Zeytullaev, who was convicted by the North Caucasian District Military Court of organizing the cell of the organization Hizb ut-Tahrir in the Crimea and sentenced to 12 years in a strict-regime prison colony, said journalist Anton Naumlyuk.

"We, the members of the European Parliament, condemn the fact that today, on April 26, 2017, Ruslan Zeytullaev, a Crimean Tatar activist, a citizen of Ukraine, was sentenced by a Russian court in Rostov-on-Don to 12 years in prison," reads the text of the document , Published by a journalist on his Facebook page.

MEPs also demanded that Russia provide access to Ukrainian consuls to the convicted Zeytullaev.

"We demand the Russian occupation authorities to guarantee free access of Ukrainian consuls to Ruslan Zeytullaev and transport him to Ukraine. Taking into account that Ruslan has been on hunger strike for three weeks, we demand urgently to provide independent medical examination and hospitalization, "the document says..

Officials also condemned the repression of the Russian Federation against other Crimean Tatars in the annexed Crimea.

"We strongly condemn all illegal and illegal repressions of the Russian occupation authorities against the Crimean Tatars who are being persecuted under the false pretext of combating Islamic radicalism in the framework of the so-called" Hizb-ut Tahrir case "," the MEPs wrote.