Category: Europe

“In 2021, it is stunning to read a report on race and ethnicity that repackages racist tropes and stereotypes into fact, twisting data and misapplying statistics and studies into conclusory findings and ad hominem attacks on people of African descent”, the UN Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent, said in a news release. The report was presented on… Read More

Zahir Tanin, Special Representative of the Secretary-General, reported on the results of the 14 February legislative election, where the winning party, Vetëvendosje, received more than half the vote, amid high turnout.   SRSG Tanin at #UNSC: “The voters in #Kosovo raised their voices for breaking with the past, and I hope that the members of this Council will add their… Read More

Last week, 176 people were detained during peaceful protests commemorating Freedom Day on 25 March, an unofficial holiday, they reported, and seven journalists were among more than 240 people apprehended days later.  Mass protests and demonstrations have continued since last August’s disputed presidential election returned Alexander Lukashenko to power. Last week, the Human Rights Council passed a resolution condemning abuses… Read More

Most countries saw a rise in coronavirus transmission last week, with 1.6 million new cases and nearly 24 000 deaths, the UN office has reported.    My message to governments in the Region is therefore that now is not the time to relax measures. We can’t afford not to heed the danger. We have all made sacrifices, but we cannot… Read More

In his former life, in Syria, Hussam worked as a journalist, and was an elite athlete. “I was the Syrian kickboxing champion three times”, he says. However, the conflict in the country put paid to his professional and sporting ambitions. “I was shot in the chest, and after that I stopped taking part in sports”. Forced to leave , Hussam… Read More

“This decision…sends a dangerous message that violence against women is not important, with the risk of encouraging perpetrators and weakening measures to prevent it”, said Dubravka Šimonović, the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women.  She noted that it will only weaken laws which provide women protection and helps keep them safe, “and leaves them at further risk at a… Read More

Dubbed the Istanbul Convention, the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence Against Women and Domestic Violence, is the “first and most comprehensive” international treaty specifically addressing these issues, UN agencies said in a statement.  “We are concerned that Turkey’s withdrawal from the Istanbul Convention would undermine the significant efforts invested so far to prevent and combat violence… Read More

Special Rapporteurs Agnès Callamard and Irene Khan believe the politician was poisoned to send a “clear, sinister warning” to anyone wanting to criticize the Government.  Mr. Navalny fell violently ill on a domestic flight from Siberia to Moscow last August. He was later flown to Germany where toxicology reports determined he had been poisoned with Novichok, a Soviet-era nerve agent. On returning to Moscow last month, he was imprisoned for violating a sentence for alleged embezzlement.  “It is our… Read More

In comments to the Geneva forum on Thursday, the High Commissioner for Human Rights insisted that curbs on demonstrators had got worse since last August’s poll returned President Alexander Lukashenko to office. Those protests had led to “mass arbitrary arrests and detentions” of largely peaceful demonstrators, along with “hundreds of allegations of torture and ill-treatment”, Ms. Bachelet said, before noting that “not… Read More

Under-Secretary-General Rosemary DiCarlo briefed ambassadors who met virtually to mark the fifth anniversary of a deal to end fighting between Ukraine Government forces and mostly pro-Russian separatists, known as the Minsk II agreement.  ‘No reason for complacency’  The ceasefire that came into force last July resulted from a summit held in December 2019 between France, Germany, Russia and Ukraine, and… Read More