New Berlin Wall cannot be allowed. An open letter to Angela Merkel

Dear Ms Merkel!

I am writing to you with my utmost respect to call on you to play a decisive role in the history of not only Europe but the whole world that is unfolding today. 

Over the past decades you have been an inspirational example of accountable leadership for many young democracies across the world, upholding principles of freedom in the toughest of moments.

You have never allowed yourself to be indifferent and have fought for the interests of all Europeans, not just Germany.

I am certain that your unstoppable service to upholding these values and principles has made you one of the most powerful political leaders of our times. 

In the spring of 2019, I had the honor of understanding and feeling what motivates you first hand, during commencement day at Harvard University. Thousands of people who were students just yesterday—like me—gathered at Harvard Yard to listen to your speech.

You spoke about your life in East Germany, during a period of full totalitarianism. You spoke about how your fellow citizens lived under total surveillance by secret services for decades. You also spoke about how in your country - dissidents were vigilantly persecuted. You described how the government of GDR was so scared people would escape to freedom that it built a massive wall, which divided your country in half. But it didn't just divide your country, it divided people– families and friends. 

Back then in May 2019, you remembered how after graduating from university you had to work in the Academy of Sciences in East Berlin. You told us that your accommodation back then was located right near the Berlin Wall. And every night when you walked home, you walked past the wall. That wall deprived you of many opportunities, it literally stood in your way. But it couldn't limit your thoughts, dreams and principles. It couldn't deprive you of the ability to dream about a different future. 

As I listened to you, amongst those thousands of young people, I started crying. I cried, because I could understand your pain. I cried, because I felt the force that moved you for so many years as the Chancellor of Germany. 

For over 8 years now, a war has engulfed my country – a war that we did not start. 

At the end of February 2014, a few days after the escape of Ukraine's ex-president, Putin's Russia occupied my home – Crimea. Back then, my parents lived in the eastern part of the peninsula. One day, as they were getting ready for work, they saw Russian tanks on the streets of their city. You yourself know what happened after: "little green men" that Putin to this day refuses to admit were the Russian army, a "referendum" carried out with guns pointed at people, a "celebratory" "reunification" of Crimea with Russia. 

A new wall appeared between me and my loved ones, this time in the 21st century. 

But for Vladimir Putin the occupation of Crimea wasn't enough.He set a goal for himself already back then - to destroy a European Ukraine, a country that chose freedom over autocracy. 

Then, war came to Donbas. War unleashed by Russia from day one, despite the fake facade of "rebels" used as an excuse by Putin. A war that divided families, made thousands of ukrainian children lose their parents, and displaced over 2 million people. 

As an accountable leader, you tried to do everything you could to stop bloodshed. It was thanks to your efforts that the Minsk agreements were created. However the question of Crimea was left outside of its scope—the brutal occupation of our Ukrainian peninsula that would forever destroy the system of international security which the world so meticulously created after the Second World War. 

In your speech back then, at Harvard Yard, you told us about how people destroyed the Berlin wall at the end of the 80s, and how the spirit of freedom engulfed countries like Czechoslovakia and Poland, who for so long also lived under Russian occupation. And just 16 years later, a scientist from East Germany became the chancellor of her own country. All thanks to her incredible ability to dream about the future in a society controlled by dictatorship.

Back then in spring of 2019, inspired by you, I also started dreaming that the wall built by dictatorial Russia would disappear in my dear Crimea. I started dreaming that the peninsula, where my people - Crimean Tatars - are once again trying to survive like during the years of Soviet deportations 70 years ago, would become free. 

But just before the 8th anniversary of the occupation of Crimea, Putin decided to start a new full-scale war against Ukraine. Everyday, he is destroying peaceful Ukrainian cities and killing our people, hiding behind slogans of denazification.

My parents, who left Crimea a year after the Russian occupation, have once again been forced to flee. At the beginning of  March, Russian shelling destroyed a couple of houses on their new street on the outskirts of Kyiv.

Russia's war against Ukraine has been going on for a whole month now. During this month more than 3,5 million Ukrainians have become refugees, 158 children have been killed and in many cities across our country there is a real humanitarian catastrophe.

The army of the country that has occupied us is killing us, but just as the Berlin wall 40 years ago, it cannot prevent us from dreaming. It cannot take away our values, principles and our right to die for them.

By invading Ukraine, Putin wanted to build a new wall between Russia and the Western World. He wanted to turn Ukraine into this wall, a country with 40 million people that already paid an insurmountable price for its right to be European, 8 years ago. 

But Putin was met with resistance. Today our whole country is fighting for our right to exist. Our army consists of more than just the hundreds of thousands of soldiers, our army consists of millions of people who everyday virulently fight for our shared victory.

This feat of Ukrainians has inspired and continues to inspire people across the whole world. It has also reminded everyone about what is most important to us. It reminds us that in the 21st century, in the center of Europe, people can only be killed  for wanting to live in a free country that wants to make its own decisions about its own future. 

Ms Merkell, you have always worried about the future of the European Union. You have always done a lot in order to strengthen and protect it. 

But today, when you have already stepped away from your active political work, Europe and the world have found themselves in an unprecedented, decisive, historical moment. And I am certain that you will not be able to stay on the sidelines. 

On behalf of Ukrainians across the world, I write to your with a plea:

• Support Ukraine's membership in the European Union. We understand that our country has a lot of problems, but it is exactly our country's young spirit and thirst for freedom that is so needed in Europe today. Our energy is what makes the European Union truly european.
• Help Ukraine in the negotiations with Russia. Help us stop the war that each day kills our people. I truly believe that you will find the right words to do just that.
• Everything that is happening today in Europe, is also a consequence of a problem that we have been ignoring for years. Everything that you held so dear to your heart and fought so virulently for over the years, today may be destroyed. It is exactly because of the mission to protect the European Union and its values that you need to return to public politics. 

Ms Merkel, I am certain that you can not let a new Berlin Wall be created on your watch in the 21st century. 

All of us cannot let this new dictatorship take hold. 

I want to end my letter to you with your own words from three years ago:

Nothing can be taken for granted and everything is possible.

I really hope that you will read this letter and respond to the pain of millions of Europeans that are suffering in this war.

Best regards and from the bottom of my heart, 

Sevgil Musaeva