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In February 2011, the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights appealed to the Polish government in reference to a case of Siergiei Magnitsky, a Russian lawyer who died in a Moscow detention facility as a result of having been held in conditions, which could be justifiably called torturous. The Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights appealed to impose appropriate visa and financial sanctions on Russian officials responsible for his death.

Voluntary organisations, institutions and individuals worldwide are welcome to nominate candidates for the 2011 Rafto Prize for Human Rights. The Rafto Prize, awarded in memory of Norwegian professor Thorolf Rafto, is awarded to an individual or organisation that embodies and upholds the principles of the Human Rights Charter through activism or engagement.

In January 2011, a Mongolian family was taken into custody of the Border Guard. The family lived in Poland for the last eleven years and faced deportation after failed efforts to legitimize their stay in the country. In January 2011 the eldest of the three children of the family made headlines when he defended his engineering thesis at Krakow’s University of Science and Technology (AGH) in the escort of Border Guard functionaries.

In January 2011 a lawyer of Al – Nashiri, former prisoner of CIA black site in Poland, appealed to the Polish Prime Minister for the support of the Polish Prosecutor’s requests to the U.S. authorities for legal assistance concerning extraordinary rendition. The Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights joined this call and pionted at the necessity to guarantee the observance of the MLAT.

Łukasz Kasprowicz, a young journalist and blogger, has been sentenced to a 10 – month freedom restriction and 300 hours of community service. On his blog, he often criticized his hometown mayor. The court found him guilty of defamation. The verdict has triggered a heated debate about freedom of expression in Poland.

Two banks in Warsaw did not allow a 84-year-old citizen Józef Głuchowski to use their toilets. The man believes that it was detrimental to his dignity and the right to intimacy. He decided to sue the banks for violating his personal rights. He demands a 15,000 PLN compensation and apology. The banks want the lawsuit to be dismissed.

On 31 January 2011 the appellate court in Lublin awarded Mr. Władysław Szczeklik compensation in the amount of 400,000 PLN for wrongful detention awaiting trial (case no. II Aka 337/10). This judgment was the result of an appeal against a decision of the regional court in Lublin of September 22, 2010, in which the court awarded compensation amounting to 200,000 PLN.

On 25 January 2011 the European Court of Human Rights in Strasburg delivered a judgment in the case Kupczak v. Republic of Poland. According to ECHR Polish authorities by failing to provide necessary medical assistance (no steps were taken in order to fix the morphine pump) violated article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

On 20 January 2011 the Polish Prosecutor officially recognizes Guantanamo prisoner Abu Zubaydah as a victim in Poland’s CIA secret prison investigation; decision should allow former “high-value detainee” to testify against his US torturers and their allies. Until now both the Polish and US governments have denied that he was illegally imprisoned and tortured in a secret prison near Szymany.