Ukrainian human rights defenders, international partners make advocacy visit to USA

From October 24 to October 29, 2022, Ukrainian human rights defenders representing Human Rights House Crimea and foreign partners made an advocacy visit to the United States to highlight the human rights situation in Crimea ahead of the vote on the thematic Resolution in the UN General Assembly Third Committee. 

Ukrainian human rights defenders and a diplomat of the Permanent Mission of Japan to the United Nations

The delegation members were Maria Kurinna, international advocacy manager at Human Rights Centre ZMINA, Volodymyr Chekryhin, expert at Crimean Human Rights Group, Maria Sulialina, project manager at “Almenda” Civic Education Center, and Matthew Jones, international advocacy officer at Human Rights House Foundation. 

Advocacy events took place in New York and promoted support for the updated UN resolution “Situation of Human Rights in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol”. 

Meetings were held with two dozen foreign missions to the UN, special rapporteurs, and civil society representatives.

Advocacy efforts of human rights defenders were focused not only on supporting cooperation with delegations of European states but also on delegations of the Global South countries, in particular those that abstained during the votes on UN General Assembly resolutions on the situation of human rights in Crimea and on the militarization of Crimea all previous years. 

Ukrainian human rights defenders and Ivars Liepnieks, counsellor at the Permanent Mission of Latvia to the UN

Human rights activists met with delegations from Rwanda, Ghana, Marshall Islands, Estonia, Poland, Japan, Georgia, Germany, France, Spain, Malawi, Djibouti, Latvia, Senegal, Kenya, Denmark, and other countries. 

Given Russia’s full-scale invasion, attention to the human rights situation in Ukraine increased, more countries began to support Resolutions on the situation in Ukraine. However, since the level of support for the Crimean Resolutions was not so high, the team’s advocacy efforts were focused on this topic. Last year, only 65 UN member states supported the Resolution on the Human Rights Situation in Crimea, 85 abstained, 18 did not vote, and 25 voted against. 

“It is necessary to build closer cooperation with the Global South countries which abstain or vote against the Resolutions on Crimea. During our conversations with the diplomats of this region, the countries of Africa, it became clear that they have a very distant idea about the real human rights situation in Crimea and its serious deterioration after February 24, 2022, they requested to send them more detailed information and are ready to cooperate,” said Maria Kurinna. 

Representatives of RAZOM for Ukraine team and Maria Kurinna

Human rights activists also met with the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief Nazila Ghanea and her team, spoke about the religiously-motivated persecution of Muslims and Jehovah’s Witnesses in the temporarily occupied Crimea, about the closure of buildings where religious ceremonies are held, etc. 

In addition, meetings were held in New York with the U.S. civil society representatives who are making efforts to advocate the interests of Ukraine in the United States, in particular with RAZOM team. 

The visit was organized by Human Rights House Foundation and Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union.