493 "On citizens of Tatar nationality, formerly living in the Crimea" (Russian: Указ № 493 «О гражданах татарской национальности, проживавших в Крыму») was issued by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet on 5 September 1967 proclaiming that "Citizens of Tatar nationality formerly living in the Crimea" [sic] were officially legally rehabilitated and had "taken root" in places of residence.
[1][2] While other deported peoples such as the Chechens, Ingush, Kalmyks, Karachays, and Balkars had long since been permitted to return to their native lands and their republics were restored in addition to other forms of political rehabilitation as recognized peoples,[3] the very same decree of 24 November 1956 “On the restoration of national autonomies of the Kalmyk, Karachay, Chechen and Ingush peoples” («О восстановлении национальных автономий калмыцкого, карачаевского, чеченского и ингушского народов») that rehabilitated those peoples in 1956[4][5] took on a genocidal tone towards internally deported Crimean Tatars, offering "national reunification" in the Tatar ASSR belonging to the distinct but similarly named Volga Tatars in lieu of restoration of the Crimean ASSR for Crimean Tatars who sought a national autonomy, despite the fact that Crimean Tatar activists did not seek a "return" to Tatarstan.
[3][16] Unlike what leaders in Moscow had promised, the decree was only published locally in areas where Crimean Tatars lived.
[5] Hero of the Soviet Union Abdraim Reshidov was among the first Crimean Tatars who tried to return to Crimea upon seeing the decree, but unlike many others he was able to get a residence permit, albeit only after resorting to threatening self-immolation.
[20] The decree was widely rebuked by people in the Crimean Tatar civil rights movement as being a "fraud", "Another step towards the liquidation of the Crimean Tatar people as a nation" (Очередной шаг в направлении ликвидации крымскотатарского народа как нации),[21] and was ridiculed by the Tashkent Ten defendants as farce.