Tatarstan: Adjusting to life in Putin's Russia
Journal: Nationalities Papers
Year: 2015

A little-noted but interesting aspect of the Russian annexation of Crimea in March 2014 was Vladimir Putin's government's attempt to enlist officials from the Republic of Tatarstan to smooth the transition of Crimea back to Russian rule. It makes sense — the Crimean and Volga Tatars are ethnic, linguistic, and religious kin, and both trace their history of statehood back to the Golden Horde successor khanates of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The Crimean Khanate maintained its independen