Four days ago, on Feb. 10, the ATR television channel began broadcasting a live stream of its empty, dark studio. The channel had to halt operations after the Ukrainian Treasury froze its financial assistance over its failure to comply with public procurement law.

The news sparked an outcry. ATR is a Crimean Tatar television channel and features broadcasts in the native language of the Crimean peninsula’s indigenous people. Since Russia illegally annexed Crimea in 2014, the broadcaster has been a lifeline for a people who increasingly find themselves dispersed across Ukraine and even abroad. An estimated 246,000 Crimean Tatars lived on the peninsula, with at least another 30,000 in mainland Ukraine.