News

The Netherlands Helsinki Committee congratulates Russian human rights activist Gregory Shvedov on being awarded the 2012 Geuzenpenning Shvedov has been fighting for human rights in Russia and the former Soviet Republics for years. Shvedov is editor-in-chief of the Caucasian Knot, an independent news and reference site covering the Caucasus region.

The Netherlands Helsinki Committee will be celebrating its 25th anniversary in October 2012. For us, this is an occasion for investigating and discussing current and future developments in promoting and protecting human rights, the rule of law and democracy in Europe and the former Soviet Union.

A special issue of Security and Human Rights is published, honouring the life and work of Max van der Stoel, who passed away earlier this year. This special SHR issue contains never before published personal recollections of distinguished authors who all worked closely with Max van der Stoel. Among the authors are Her Majesty Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, Danilo Turk (President of Slovenia), Peter Kooijmans (former Foreign Minister of the Netherlands) and Knut Vollebaek (former Foreign Minister of Norway and the present OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities). The special issue offers unique insights in many aspects of the multifaceted work of Max van der Stoel that have largely remained outside the public domain so far.

Het Nederlands Helsinki Comité (NHC) organiseert op woensdag 19 oktober een debat over de Olympische Spelen en mensenrechten. Dit debat is de tweede bijeenkomst in een reeks 'Mensenrechtenavonden' die het NHC organiseert in het Humanity House om de discussie over mensenrechtenkwesties te bevorderen.

Twenty years after the Soviet Union dissolved and Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan gained independence, civil society activities remain seriously restricted in these countries. In a joint contribution to the upcoming OSCE Human Dimension Implementation Meeting in Warsaw, two European and three Central Asian NGOs highlight how the authorities of the three countries continue to stifle the rights of their citizens to freely and peacefully assemble, associate and engage in activities to promote human rights.

International human rights organizations, including the Netherlands Helsinki Committee, are calling on the UN Human Rights Council to continue addressing the situation in Belarus. In contradiction to the June resolution of the Council on Belarus, further steps have been taken by the authorities to repress freedom of expression and to thwart fair trials. Harassment of human rights defenders has been stepped up, with Ales Bialiatisky, the leader of human rights organisation Viasna, being imprisoned.

For trafficked victims the hell does not end when they get out of the trafficking chain. According to extensive research that has been done for the last 10 years by Serbian anti-trafficking NGO ASTRA budgetary allocations for victim assistance do not exist when putting aside salaries of the employees in the institutions that should be working on improvement of the aid for trafficking victims. ASTRA recently published a Ten-Year Report on Human Trafficking in Serbia which concluded that the Serbian government does not provide sufficient, efficient, nor systemically organized support to trafficking victims.

The Netherlands Helsinki Committee and the International Partnership for Human Rights condemn the hacking of the website of its partner organization Turkmen Initiative for Human Rights, as well as other recent incidents of harassment targeting the organization. There are concerns about the safety and well-being of all individuals living inside Turkmenistan who the authorities link to this organization.