Latest

Two weeks before Presidential election in Russia, board of directors of the independent radio station Ekho Moskvy was changed. This week the Moscow Prosecutor’s Office announced that the online television station Dozhd TV was under investigation to determine who financed the channel’s broadcasts of anti-Kremlin demonstrations. French journalist and author Anne Nivat expelled from the country for interviewing opposition.

Russian authorities ordered to block the website of a public health organization, the Andrey Rylkov Foundation, for discussing the addiction medicine methadone. “Now, even our speaking about it seems to be banned”, says president of the foundation. Human rights organizations, including Article 19, interpret the move as an assault on freedom of expression.

Объявляется набор для участия в программе дистанционного обучения адвокатов и юристов международному праву прав человека. Отбор участников производится на конкурсной основе.

Human Rights House Foundation condemns the arrests of several hundred people demonstrated after the Duma election in Russia on the 4th of December and call upon Russian authorities to respect freedom of assembly.

Just before midnight on 15 December – coincidentally national day for remembering killed Russian journalists – the founder of the independent weekly newspaper Chernovik, Khadimurad Kamalov, was shot dead in the southern Russian republic of Dagestan.

According to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) as many as 8-10,000 defamation cases a year had been filed against journalists and media outlets for defamation in Russia. Recent amendments to Russia’s defamation legislation – including partial decriminalisation of libel and insult – will not improve the situation for the media in the country, says Article 19.

The Human Rights House Foundation, together with partner organisations from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia and the Russian Federation, took part at the OSCE Human Dimension Implementation meeting in Warsaw on 25-29 September 2011. It made several interventions, addressing human rights issues in the countries, co-organised side events on Belarus and protection of human rights defenders and organised a protest campaign against the arrest of Ales Bialiatski. Maria Dahle, the Executive Director of HRHF, opened the 3rd working session on freedom of peaceful assembly, freedom of association, national HR institutions and HR education.

Several key areas where Russian government has yet to make a progress if the country wants to be more democratic remain to be a core issue with regard to human rights within Russian Federation. It was outlined during the visit of human rights defenders from the Norwegian Helsinki Committee to St. Petersburg and Moscow on 8-12 September.

On 14 June, a Moscow court ruled to acquit Oleg Orlov, Chair of the Memorial Human Rights Society, one of Europe’s most respected human rights groups. Mr. Orlov was charged with defamation against Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, in connection with statements Orlov made at the time Memorial employee and award winning human rights defender Natalya Estemirova was killed in 2009.