Migration
🇺🇦 Ukraine Crisis – Muslim Population & Islamic Communities in Ukraine
In the beginning of the twentieth century, Muslims constituted a third of the population of Crimea, and a large number of Muslims inhabited most of the major cities in the Crimea. However, during World War II, the Soviet leadership accused the Crimean Muslims of collaborating with Nazi Germany and thus were subjected to mass deportations in 1944.
Total population: 44 million
Muslim population ( 2019): 500, 000
Islam in Ukraine
More than 200,000 Crimean Tatars were deported to Central Asia, particularly to the land that would later become Uzbekistan.
The Crimean Tatars were only able to return to Crimea after the collapse of the Soviet Union and Ukraine’s independence. Russia annexed the Crimea region.
Estimates of the Ukrainian Muslim population vary. According to the State Statistics Service of Ukraine, the total population of the peninsula is 2,353,000.
There are no independent recent statistics that provide data on the religious affiliations of the population, despite the presence of approximately 300, 000 Crimean Tatars, who make up 13 percent of the population and are mostly Muslims.
