followed by a march under the black banners, emotional speeches and burning down of the US flag. The speakers denounced both "pro-Assad" and "pro-democratic" policies pursued by Russia and the US in Syria respectively, and called for the Sharia law there. More street actions and minor fights with police followed until police blocked a march of 25 vehicles decorated with HT banners and arrested the leader of Dagestani HT cell, Magomed Kartashov. In an article in Time magazine of 8 May 2013, investigative journalist Simon Shuster published his findings about the extensive contacts between the detained Kartashov and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the man responsible for the Boston Marathon bombing of 2013, that took place in Dagestan as Tsarnaev visited Russia before the bombing. In October 2015, 20 supporters of Hizb ut-Tahrir, were detained in and around Moscow, and "up to 100 others" were under investigation, according to a "source in Moscow's security services." In October 2018, the head of Russian wing of HT was reported to have been arrested in Tatarstan for planning of the terrorist actions against the law and order. Hizb ut-Tahrir operates in Crimea among the Crimean Tatars. Following the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea at least 19 people were arrested on suspicion of membership. (Since the annexation, the status of Crimea is under dispute between Russia and Ukraine; Ukraine and the majority of the international community considers Crimea an integral part of Ukraine, while Russia, on the other hand, considers Crimea an integral part of Russia, with Sevastopol functioning as a federal city. Russian authorities are in control of both). According to the head of FSB, during 2018 three HT cells were deactivated in Crimea. Ruslan Balbek, member of the Russian Parliamentary Committee for Religious Matters claimed that the existing Crimean HT cells remained there "since the time of the Ukrainian rule and are financed from abroad". As Ukrainian news outlet Strana.ua reported, before 2014 Crimean HT activists were not persecuted as HT was not deemed terrorist organization in the Ukraine, but once the Russian authorities initiated a massive crackdown on the banned HT in Russia proper and in Crimea, many HT activists fled Russia for Ukraine and settled mostly in Odessa, where they are expecting a refugee status that Ukrainian authorities are very reluctant to provide. In August 2022, TASS reported that the Russian Federal Security Service has busted a Hizb ut-Tahrir clandestine terror cell in