Dzhemilev was born on 13 November 1943 in Ay-Serez, Crimea, then Russian SFSR, though at the time under Nazi German occupation. He was only six months old when his family, with the rest of the Crimean Tatar population, was deported by Soviet authorities in May 1944, soon after Soviet forces retook the peninsula. He grew up in exile, in the Uzbek SSR. At the age of 18, Dzhemilev and several of his activist friends established the Union of Young Crimean Tatars. He thus began the arduous and long struggle for the recognition of the rights of Crimean Tatars to return to their homeland. Between 1966 and 1986, Dzhemilev was arrested six times for anti-Soviet activities and served time in Soviet prisons and labor camps and lived under surveillance. Dzhemilev is also remembered for going on the longest hunger strike in the history of human rights movements. The hunger strike lasted for 303 days, but he survived due to forced feeding. He was expelled in the second year from the Tashkent engineers of irrigation and reclamation of agriculture "for unworthy behavior", namely the writing of historical work on the history of Turkic culture in the Crimea before the elimination of the Crimean Khanate from "nationalist" positions. In May 1989, he was elected to head the newly founded Crimean Tatar National Movement. The same year he returned to Crimea with his family, a move that would be followed by the eventual return of 250,000 Tatars to their homeland.
Dzhemilev was in Ankara during the Crimean referendum. After the preliminary results of the referendum were announced, he held a joint press conference with the Turkish foreign ministerAhmet Davutoğlu. Dzhemilev declared that the Mejlis had a stance identical with Turkey in considering the referendum illegal and claimed that the results were manipulated by Russia. In April 2014, Dzhemilev was handed a document on the Ukrainian border informing him he is banned by federal law from entering Russian territory for five years. The typewritten document was unsigned, with no official heading, and was made public by the Crimean Tatar parliament, the Mejlis. A spokesman for the Russian Federal Migration Service said the agency did not have any information on the travel ban. On 3 May, Dzhemilev tried to cross the "border" between the Kherson oblast and the breakaway Republic of Crimea, but he was unable to do so, due to Russian occupational forces blocking the road with tanks. Russian authorities then issued an arrest warrant for Dzhemilev and placed him on the federal wanted list, allegedly for trying to illegally cross the border when he attempted to return to Crimea.
Awards
Dzhemilev has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize several times, by various NGOs and persons. In October 1998, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees awarded Dzhemilev the Nansen Medal for his outstanding efforts and "his commitment to the right of return of the Crimean Tatars." In an interview Dzhemilev gave shortly after receiving the Nansen Medal, he emphasized that "when violent means are used, innocent people die, and no just cause can justify the taking of innocent lives." The Crimean Tatar National Movement has been marked by persistent reliance on non-violence. On 14 April 2014, Dzhemilev was awarded the Order of the Republic by Turkish President Abdullah Gül. On 3 June 2014, Dzhemilev was awarded as the first recipient of the Solidarity Prize, by the Republic of Poland.
