SIMFEROPOL, Crimea (AP) — As armed pro-Russian forces spread out across Crimea, Mustafa Maushev joined his Tatar neighbors on a nightly vigil to keep intruders off their property.

Almost exactly 70 years ago, Tatars were expelled from their homeland as a result of one of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin’s merciless mass deportations of perceived enemies of the state. Decades later, as the Soviet Union was crumbling, many returned and slowly reclaimed their place.