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Oktober 22, 2012 marked the stone-laying ceremony for the mosque in Okhotnikovo village located in the Saki district. The construction supervisor is the All-Ukrainian Association of Public Organizations “Alraid”, with assistance from the Religious Administration of Muslims of Crimea and the Muslim community of Saki town. The mosque is designed to accommodate 250 families of parishioners residing in this and nearby villages.  

 

 

 

The stone-laying ceremony gathered nearly 200 people. Mr.Valery Grinevich, deputy of the Verkhovna Rada (Parliament) of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, Mrs.Tatyana Polischuk, village major of Okhotnikovo, Mr. Seyran Arifov, chairman of the “Alraid” auditing commission, and Mr. Mahammad Taha, chairman of the Crimean division of “Alraid” all came to share joy with the local Muslims community.

 

 

Mr. Seyran Arifov in his ceremonial speech points out that although the mosque is being built nearby a Christian church, country people of various confessions treat with understanding and respect each other’s cult needs, which lays a firm ground for good neighborhood relations in Okhotnikovo.

 

78 years old Rifat Abdulrahmanov does not hide his joy, as he could live up till the time when a mosque appeared in his native village where he had come back from deportation. The Mosque of Jaga-Kuschu (Cağa Quşçı in Crimean Tatar language), the former name of Okhotnikovo, used to be center of community life since the earliest years of this locality existence.

 

 

It was ruined by the soviet power after deportation of Crimean Tatar people on May 18, 1944. The village lost its population, its mosque, and, eventually, its name, once an unnamed locality of the sovkhoz (collective farm in the soviet times) Jaga-Kuschu was renamed into Okhotnikovo following the Degree of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) from May 18, 1948.

 

 

For Crimean Tatars, a mosque is not merely a cult building, but also the center for cultural and community life. Mosques have a key role in cultural and religious renaissance of Crimean Tatar people coming to the homeland after years of deportation, their adaptation to the new environment, functioning of institutes for the community’s self-governance and mutual assistance.

 

 

Unfortunately, most part of Crimean mosques were ruined or disassembled for house building purposes by new residents of the peninsula. Besides that, not all of the preserved mosques have been returned to communities of faithful so far, and many of the mosques which primary purpose could be re-established, are in breakdown condition and require urgent reconstruction.