FINROSFORUM: Finnish NGOs Commemorate Natalia Estemirova
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posted by eagle on July, 2009 as Human Rights
Finnish civic activists have called a demonstration for 17 July 2009 to commemorate the Russian human rights activist, Natalia Estemirova, who was murdered in Chechnya on 15 July 2009. The demonstrators demand that Russian authorities carry out a prompt and thorough investigation into the murder of Natalia Estemirova and other human rights defenders, and that the perpetrators be brought to justice. The demonstration will take place outside the Russian Embassy in Helsinki (Tehtaankatu 1) on 17 July 2009 at 16:00. The organisers of the demonstration are Amnesty International Finnish Section, Finnish PEN, the Finnish Peace Committee, and the Finnish-Russian Civic Forum. Torture, disappearances, murders and other serious human rights violations continue unabated in Russia. The crimes are often left uninvestigated and the perpetrators are seldom held accountable. The murder of Natalia Estemirova highlights the dangerous conditions under which human rights activists work in Russia. The ... >> full...
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FINROSFORUM: Heidi Hautala Gets Top Human Rights Post
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posted by eagle on as Human Rights
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Prague Watchdog: We Will Remember You, Natasha
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posted by eagle on as Human Rights
We will remember you, NatashaBy Andrei Babitsky, special to Prague Watchdog Today Natasha Estemirova was murdered. I am afraid that the political significance of this killing, about which many words are going to be written, will obscure the tragedy of the death of a very good person, and the intolerable pain, bitterness and rage of hundreds and thousands of people who knew her. The Russian government no longer restricts itself in its choice of victims. Among those who are abducted, killed, or go missing in Chechnya are Russian citizens of every kind: ordinary people, businessmen, government officials. In Chechnya there is no longer any question of political rights. Although it does not understand the extraterritorial nature of humanitarian law, Russia’s power elite is nevertheless forced at least sometimes to respond to the protests of Western public opinion about the very serious violations of human rights ... |
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Window On Eurasia: Russians Now View Political Murders As Something They Can Do Little About, Rights Activists Say
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posted by eagle on as Human Rights
Paul Goble
Vienna, July 17 – As reaction to the murder of Natalya Estemirova shows, two Moscow rights activists say, political murders have become so common in Russia that ever more Russians now view them as part of the ordinary course of events, occasions for “tearful grief but not anger or protest” against the system that created the conditions for them.
In a comment posted on the Civitas.ru portal this week, Nadezhda Nizovkina and Tatyana Stetsura argue that the kidnapping and murder of the Grozny journalist is especially horrible because it shows that Russians have become “so accustomed to political murders that [they] consider them a natural way of death” (www.vestnikcivitas.ru/pbls/754).
“Natalya Estemirova was the first laureate of the Anna Politkovskaya Prize,” they point out, suggesting that “this award as a symbol of ...
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NY Times: Rights Campaigner In Chechnya Killed
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posted by eagle on as Human Rights
Rights Campaigner in Chechnya Killed
Dylan Martinez/Reuters Chechen journalist and activist Natalia Estemirova in London in 2007. By MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ Published: July 15, 2009
MOSCOW — A prominent Russian human rights campaigner who worked to expose government-backed kidnappings inChechnya was killed after being kidnapped herself there on Wednesday, Russian investigators said. The woman, Natalia Estemirova, was an employee with theRussian human rights group Memorial. She worked for years helping families uncover details about kidnapped relatives. She was the recipient of several international awards, and in 2007 was the first to win the Anna Politkovskaya Award, named for the Russian investigative journalist, who also worked to uncover abuses in Chechnya before she was shot to death in October 2006. Ms. Estemirova’s work often ran afoul of the Chechen government, led by the Kremlin-backed strongman Ramzan A. Kadyrov, who human rights groups have accused of personally torturing kidnap victims. The Russian president, Dmitri A. Medvedev, expressed condolences to her relatives and friends in a statement released by the ...
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