Russian NGO needs help: Calls for European MPs’ support membership

Today, the Supreme Court in the Russian Federation will decide on the fate of human rights organisation Russian-Chechen Friendhip Society. It now pleads to European Members of Parliament for help. So far more than 80 persons have signed an open letter of support , including Nobel Laureate Harold Pinter, Noam Chomsky, and a number of European MPs.
You can send an email with your signature to ivanah@ned.org (National Endowment for Democracy) and frank@ihf-hr.org (International Helsinki Federation)(23-JAN-07)

Source: The International Helsinki Federation. Picture: Human Rights House Foundation visited the RCFS´s office in Nizhny Novgorod in February 2006.

In December a Finnish Green Party MP and former European Parliament deputy, Heidi Hautala, became a member of the Russian-Chechen Friendship Society (RCFS):
 – It´s a highly symbolic but practical way of expressing concern about the difficult situation for the organization in the hands of the authorities and court system. I also hope that a lot more members of European parliaments will take the same decision. Together we can convince our governments about the urgent need to show the Russian Federation that what it above all now needs is a free civil society. I thus apply for supporting membership in NN RCFS, Hautala said. 

The Russian-Chechen Friendship Society are now calling on politicians and public people of the European countries to follow Heidi Hautala and support the organisation with that specific act of solidarity.

RCFS leader Stanislav Dmitrievsky (right) was convicted for enticing ethnic hatred after publishing peace appeals.

Read the letter of support

Send an email with your signature to ivanah@ned.org (National Endowment for Democracy) og frank@ihf-hr.org (International Helsinki Federation)

Read the appeal  

SEND APPLICATION ON SUPPORTIVE MEMBERSHIP IN RCFS: E-MAIL FRIEND@SINN:RU OR FAX +7 831 233 7334

See also: Prosecutor demands to shut down the Russian-Chechen Friendship Society (13-OCT-06)