Civil Rights Defenders delegates in the Ukraine monitoring and reporting on the recent carnage in Kiev.
Eastern Europe &
Central Asia
The Winter Olympics in Sochi has directed the
media spotlight on Russia especially when it comes
to LGBT people’s rights and also the dire human
rights situation in the North Caucasus. A massive
campaign against civil society was launched in Russia in 2012 and a number of laws restricting basic
rights, such as freedom of speech, assembly and association, were introduced and are being used to supress independent voices. Torture at all levels of the
judicial system is commonplace.
Belarus continues to imprison political opponents,
harass civil society groups and enforce stringent
controls over the media. The Central Asian states
are blighted with corruption, lack of free, fair and
transparent elections and are ruled by authoritarian
governments. In Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan human rights work is close to impossible.
In the South Caucasus, Azerbaijan is the most authoritarian country where human rights defenders
and other government critics risk threats, violence
and imprisonments. The main challenges facing
Moldova are the poor implementation of laws, a high
level of corruption, public distrust of the judiciary
and law enforcement, and discrimination of minorities and vulnerable groups. The country also remains geographically and politically divided with
the breakaway region of Transnistria, which poses
challenges to ensuring protection of civil and political rights. In the Ukraine political uncertaintly
and recent developments have meant a major crack
down on the population and civil society.
Civil Rights Defenders works in Eastern Europe
and Central Asia to improve the very difficult human rights situation and protect and empower human rights defenders who face widespread restrictions, discrimination and threats. LGBT groups in
Russia and other parts of the region face persecution because of their sexual orientation. Political
prisoners languish in detention centres in Russia,
Belarus, Azerbaijan and Central Asia just for voicing their opinions and daring to challenge the ruling regime while in Ukraine dozens of protestors
have been murdered for exercising their rights to
freedom of assembly.
The work we do in Eastern Europe &
Central Asia.
Civil Rights Defenders provides security training for human rights defenders at risk and have
equipped several activists in the North Caucasus
with the Natalia bracelet security system. We work
continuously to keep the attention of Swedish and
European decision makers on the human rights
situation in general and specific violations in particular. We empower our partners through training
and support, and advocate for the release of imprisoned human rights defenders, like Ales Bialiatski
from Belarus. We also support marginalised groups
such as LGBT communities in their fight against
discrimination.
Highlights of 2013.
Belarus: Our cooperation with the Belarusian
Human Rights House based in Vilnius has enabled
trainings as well as meeting facilitation and possibilities to conduct activities for Belarusian human
rights defenders, among other the third Belarusian human rights defender forum which was held
in October 2013. This provides Belarusian human
rights activists with a safe and secure place to carry
out their work as it’s currently impossible to do so
in Belarus.
Our cooperation within the Bring International
Standards Home-programme has facilitated the
training of 19 lawyers in 2013. We are currently
training another group of human rights defenders
17
on the promotion and protection of human rights
in Belarus.
Our media partner Euroradio has the highest ratings
among the external broadcasters. It is an important
source of objective information for Belarusian society and frequently raises human rights issues.
Russia: Stockholm Pride 2013 became a major focus highlighting the negative developments that the
LGBT community continues to experience in Russia. Civil Rights Defenders organised an exchange
between groups of parents from Russia and Sweden,
with the primary goal to provide support, and empowerment.
Moldova: Civil Rights Defenders and our partner GenderDoc-M had campaigned for 15 years for
the authorities to introduce legislation regarding
the freedom of assembly. This basic right was finally
guaranteed in February 2013.
As a result of this breakthrough Moldova’s first
legally sanctioned Pride parade took place in May
2013. It was a huge success in a traditionally conservative, homophobic society while the Moldovan
LGBT community finally gained visibility.
Azerbaijan: As part of our monitoring and
advocacy efforts, we published a report on human
rights abuses in Azerbaijan one year after the Euro
vision in Baku. The report was published a week before Eurovision in Sweden and received widespread
media-attention.
Ukraine: We sent a team of monitors to Kiev,
Ukraine, to report on the human rights violations
occurring during the recent protests and political
turmoil.