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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.

A prominent Russian human rights activist of Uzbek origin Bakhrom Khamroev was attacked and beaten in his Moscow apartment block on 6 May 2011. He was hospitalized, police have launched an investigation into the incident. The Norwegian Helsinki Committee is deeply distraught to learn of yet another violent attack on employee of Human Rights Center Memorial.

On 30-31 May the Russian Research Center for Human Rights in cooperation with Conference of International NGOs of the Council of Europe held a conference ‘Respect for Human Rights in Closed Establishments of Russia’ in Yekaterinburg.
Representatives of Council of Europe, member organizations of the Center, as well as other regional NGOs, members of Public Supervising Committees and media representatives discussed the results of the monitoring of human rights violations in closed establishments and the work of Public Supervising Committees.

RRCHR in cooperation with Council of Europe will hold conference ‘Respect for Human Rights in Closed Establishments of Russia’. The participants will focus on such issues as progress and difficulties in work of Public Supervising Committees, analysis of the situation in colonies for juveniles and psychiatric hospitals and best practices of civil society’s monitoring of closed establishments, national and international experience.