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In September 2015 a unique book was published: from the experience of the Belarusian human rights defenders it shows that international legal standards in the field of human rights can “work” even in a country such as Belarus.

Aliaksandr Lukashenka has begun his fifth five-year term. The final statistics of voting, announced by the Central Election Commission (83.5% for Lukashenka), were not surprising.
In contrast to the large-scale protests that took place in Belarus following the 2010 elections, these results were met with an apprehensive trickle of discontent consisting of a mere few hundred people who walked through the streets of Minsk and finished their protest with a prayer. Experts predict the end of the short-term thaw and the return to the pre-election regime of repressions and economic stagnation.

Belarus for the first time since 1997 will provide the UN Human Rights Committee a report on the implementation of its international obligations. The list of issues reported on by the country to the Committee also includes the ones that have been recommended by the Belarusian human rights defenders.

On 15 October, the UN Human Rights Committee (CCPR) has confirmed the registration of the communication, submitted by the coordinator of the campaign “Human Rights Defenders Against the Death Penalty in Belarus” Andrei Paluda, on behalf of Siarhei Ivanou, who was sentenced to death.

The elections in Belarus were not free and did not meet international standards. These findings were announced by the election observers on 12 October during the press conference at the Barys Zvozskau Belarusian Human Rights House.

According to the preliminary data of the Central Election Committee Aliaksandr Lukashenka won the presidential election by a landslide. Belarusian human rights activists claim there were substantial violations of international standards. The same view is shared by OSCE ODIHR observers. CIS mission observers stated the elections to be exemplary.

On 7 October the discussion “(Il)legal killing…” was held in Vilnius with the participation of the Belarusian human rights defenders, journalists and representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania. The discussion was organized by the the Barys Zvozskau Belarusian Human Rights House in partnership with the human rights organization Freedom House, and was one in a number of events within the Week against the death penalty in Belarus.

On 13 October, 2015 a press conference on the results of the presidential election, that is to take place in Belarus on 11 October 2015, will be held at the Barys Zvozskau Belarusian Human Rights House.

During the ninth working meeting of the OSCE Human Dimension Conference in Warsaw, on 25 September the problems of democratic institutions, including democratic elections, were raised. Uladzimir Labkovich (right), coordinator of the campaign “Human Rights Defenders for Free Elections”, presented the position of Belarusian human rights defenders on the current presidential election.