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-I feel good in Poland. Almost always
Six students – participants of the Human Rights Workshops for Students organized by the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights – have decided to fight against verbal discrimination. They contrived a social campaign, the aim of which is to introduce changes in their surroundings. Currently, they are initiating the campaign ‘I feel good in Republic of Poland. Almost always’. (27-MAY-08)
Racist incidents on Polish football arenas
To the problem of corruption in Polish football was recently added the issue of racism. There is news of racist outbursts after nearly every round of league play. Clubs, whose arenas stage these excesses, remain unpunished. On 9 of May 2008, the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights sent a letter to the Prime Minister Donald Tusk, in which it voiced serious concern about recent racist incidents. (16-MAY-08)
Supermarket faces the court for discriminating the blind
Jolanta Kramarz, a blind person, has been using a guide dog for several years. Because of the dog, she has not been allowed to enter various public institutions, stores or restaurants. She has also been asked to leave the subway and city buses, despite the existence of the Warsaw City Council resolution, which excludes guide dogs from under all restrictions.(14-MAY-08)
Lech Walesa honoured with human rights award
Former Polish President Lech Walesa has been awarded a gilded pigeon statuette, funded on the 60th anniversary of adopting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the United Nations General Assembly. Lech Walesa received the award on account of his contributions to human rights issues. (12-MAY-08)
Poland before the UN Human Rights Council
Republic of Poland, as one of the first UN countries, was subject to the Universal Periodic Review of Human Rights procedure. The review is conducted by the UN Human Rights Council. Polish nongovernmental organizations, i.e. the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights, questioned the governmental report stating that in this report the government presented the situation in the Republic of Poland ´in a simplified and overly optimistic manner´. (24-APR-08)
How do we – Poles – see refugees
On 14 April 2008, TNS OBOP published a study regarding the issue of: ´Our perception of refugees´. The study was based on a sample of 1000 randomly selected residents of Warsaw and 500 people from the nearby town of Gora Kalwaria, where a refugee center is located. It is difficult for refugees to become assimilated with the Polish society. Why? (18-APR-08)
About the ‘Hominem Quaero’ project
On 10 April, as part of the Thursday Club, the Association POLIS invited the originators and participants of the undertaking ´Hominem Quaero´ to share their experiences from the implementation of this pro-tolerance project, which was created as an answer to a need of breaking interculutral and interpersonal barriers in a culturally and ethnically homogeneous polish society. (11-APR-08)
Starvation death of a Romanian at a detention center
On 18 January, a Romanian citizen died at a hospital in Krakow after being transported there from a detention awaiting trial. Doctors stated extreme emaciation of his organism as a result of a four-month-long hunger strike. The 33-year old Claudiu Crulic (1.75 m in height) weighed 40 kg at the time of death. The case was recently described by the weekly ‘Tygodnik Powszechny’. (09-APR-08)
The “Strasbourg live” initiative – shared watching of hearings before the ECHR
For some time now, the Court in Strasbourg has been re-broadcasting hearings held before the Grand Chamber, which could later be watched in the Internet. These are usually very interesting cases that deal with issues controversial from the perspective of human rights. For the first time, the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights organized a session of shared watching of a trial held before the ECHR.(29-MAR-08)