Russian occupation authorities confiscate Eurovision winner Jamala’s house in Crimea

Russians have confiscated the house of Ukrainian singer Jamala in occupied Crimea, who won the Eurovision Song Contest in 2016 with her song “1944”.

Earlier, Russian authorities announced plans to confiscate the property and assets of 110 Ukrainian individuals and legal entities who “carry out unfriendly actions towards Russia,” including Jamala, according to the ZMINA human rights center.

The occupiers initiated criminal proceedings against Jamala and she was put on the wanted list for spreading “false information about the Russian armed forces”.

“They took my house away from me! They’re taking away what my parents lived for. What they worked so hard for and what they built with their own hands, their sweat and their blood. They didn’t even take it away from me, they took it away from my parents. I just can’t keep quiet. I won’t keep quiet.” Jamala wrote on social media.

She also said that the occupiers also searched her parents’ belongings and family archives.

“If there is justice in the world, Russia will be held accountable for everything. For all our tears, for our relatives and friends, for our homes, for our country.” added the singer.

In 2024, Ukrainian and Crimean Tatar singer Jamala was awarded the 2024 National Taras Shevchenko Prize. This award, which has been awarded since 1961, is Ukraine’s highest state award for works of culture and art.

According to the Ukrainian Presidential Office, she was awarded for her album of traditional Crimean Tatar songs, QIRIM Ukraine.

The album consists of 14 songs that the singer and her team collected from different parts of the peninsula. On the official release website there is an interactive map where anyone can listen to a song, read its lyrics and learn its story.

Work on the album took years, but with the start of the large-scale invasion, its fate was left in limbo, as the already completed album had to be left under fire in the Kiev region.