ST. PETERSBURG – The St. Petersburg Council on Human Rights, an independent non-governmental organization, of which the Environmental Rights Center Bellona (ERC Bellona) is a member, has released a comprehensive and shocking review of human rights abuses committed throughout Russia in 2007.
The council is also comprised of eminent St. Petersburg-based human rights and judicial watch dog organizations such as Citizen’s Watch, Memorial, Lawyers for Human Rights, Soldiers’ Mothers of St. Petersburg, the Galina Starovoitova Museum, For Russia Without Racism, International Bar “St. Petersburg,” Liga Women Votes of St. Petersburg, and the Regional Press Institute.
The report is a shocking indictment of human rights violations and civil abuses documented by direct interviews and by the Russian media, and focuses on government sponsored abuses from racially motivated attacks, pandemic hazing in the Russian military, abuse of prisoners in pre-trial detention facilities and penal colonies, censorship and suppression of the independent media, violent suppression of peaceful demonstrations, routine police abuses against foreigners and Russians alike, and the routine neglect of law enforcement officials of rape reports filed by women.
The report provides in-depth analysis of these issues in the context of the Russian constitution – and how each of these issues constitutes a violation of each Russian citizen’s right to legal protections.
The report also offers considered recommendations to the government on how to address these issues and guarantee the rights of Russian and foreign citizens alike.
Download the report in Word format in the box to the right.
