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Elena Talkacheva is a journalist and was a business reporter for the independent news website, Tut.by. She was detained alongside 14 of her colleagues on 18 May 2021 in the framework of a criminal case initiated against Tut.by for tax evasion.

Marfa Rabkova is a human rights defender and a coordination of the volunteer service at the Human Rights Centre Viasna. She took part in the campaign “Human Rights Defenders for Free Elections”, which saw over 1,500 observers register for election monitoring during the 2020 presidential election. Rabkova was detained on 17 September 2020.

Volha Takarchuk runs a political vlog with almost 37,000 subscribers. She was detained several times after the August 2020 election, but on the morning of 19 May her apartment was searched, some of her belongings were seized, and she was detained. She has remained in prison since then.

In September 2020, the prominent Belarusian opposition figure Maryia Kalesnikava was abducted from Minsk and taken to the border where security forces tried to expel her from the country; she ripped up her passport in defiance. In the days that followed she was charged with incitement to undermine national security and placed in pre-trial detention. The letter that follows was written by Maryia Kalesnikava to her father on 16 July 2021, the day the Supreme Court rejected her complaint regarding the extension of her detention until 1 August.

2020 was a year of unprecedented challenges in the wake of COVID-19. In our annual report, discover how Human Rights House Foundation and the network of Human Rights Houses adapted to meet these new challenges and continue our work together to advance human rights at home and abroad.

Human Rights House Foundation condemns the latest attacks against women human rights defenders in Azerbaijan, including the abhorrent practise of targeting their privacy. We call on the Azerbaijani authorities to immediately stop the violations of the freedom of assembly and expression of their citizens, as well as to take steps to ensure the protection of all human rights defenders, including women human rights defenders and young human rights defenders.

“The very first women-only protest happened at midday on Wednesday, 12 August 2020. Women all dressed in white gathered in central Minsk, to show that we protesters are peaceful, and we are against violence.”

Three organisations working on women’s rights in different countries have connected to share experience and advocacy strategies for combatting gender-based violence.

Discover in our 2019/20 annual report how Human Rights House Foundation protected and advanced the rights of human rights defenders, strengthened independent civil society, and supported a strong, active network of Human Rights Houses.