Human Rights Survival Guide

One moment you stand up for your people's right to democracy and freedom, the next you are sentenced to 15 days of detention. Unimaginable? Not in Belarus.

This is the story of a woman who lived through that experience twice, and wrote a survival guide to Belarusian prison. In this third episode, you'll hear advice on how to stay relatively sane during detention.

The third episode covers 15 days of detention: psychological hygiene, organisation of everyday life, rituals and pastimes, and liberation.

If you want to learn more about the Belarusian struggle for freedom, you might find Aliaksei Paluyan's 2021 documentary 'Courage' and Krzysztof Lukaszewicz's 2013 drama 'Viva Belarus' interesting.

Find out how you can support and express solidarity:

Write a letter to a political prisoner: https://spring96.org/en/news/101367DissidentBY: https://dissidentby.com/en, a non-profit initiative supporting political prisoners.BY_help: https://www.belarus97.pro/eng, a civic campaign supporting dissidents and their families.Politvyazynka: https://m.facebook.com/100085144390317/ https://instagram.com/politvyazynka?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=, an activist's project highlighting female political prisoners.

Learn more about the Akrestsina pre-trial detention centre: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okrestina

To not miss out on the other survival guide chapters, subscribe to our podcast and automatically get the next episodes in your feed.

One moment you’re standing up for freedom and democracy, the next you’re sentenced to 15 days’ detention. Unimaginable? Not in Belarus.

This is the story of a woman who lived through that experience twice and transformed it into a guide to surviving Belarusian prison.

This is the second episode of the mini-series, covering arrest and trial.

If you want to learn more about Belarus’ struggle for freedom, you may enjoy Aliaksei Paluyan's 2021 documentary 'Courage' and Krzysztof Lukaszewicz's 2013 drama 'Viva Belarus'.

Also, read the today's statement by international and Belarusian rights groups calling to end the ill-treatment of Maria Kalesnikava and all the other political prisoners: https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/06/12/belarus-stop-ill-treatment-opposition-politician

Want to support the cause and express your solidarity? Here are some ways you can do that:

Learn more about the Akrestsina pre-trial detention centre: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okrestina

Belarusians singing ‘Peremen’ by Kino, which became the anthem of the democratic opposition: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMdrQvQRFzM

To avoid missing out on the remaining survival guide chapters, subscribe to our podcast and automatically have new episodes appear in your feed.

One moment you’re standing up for freedom and democracy, the next you’re sentenced to 15 days’ detention. Unimaginable? Not in Belarus.

This is the story of a woman who lived through that experience twice and used that experience to write a guide to surviving Belarusian prison. In this first episode, you'll hear how to prepare for detention because, sadly, in Belarus, ordinary citizens can become political prisoners at any given moment.

If you want to learn more about Belarus’ struggle for freedom, you may enjoy Aliaksei Paluyan's 2021 documentary 'Courage' and Krzysztof Lukaszewicz's 2013 drama 'Viva Belarus'.

Here are some ways you can support the cause and express your solidarity:

Learn more about the Akrestsina pre-trial detention centre: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okrestina

To avoid missing out on the remaining survival guide chapters, subscribe to our podcast and automatically have new episodes appear in your feed.

How do international financial institutions (IFIs) conduct due diligence on projects they finance? In this episode we will try to answer this question together with Xavier Sol - Director of Counter Balance, and Manana Kochladze - Chairwoman of Georgian NGO "Green Alternative" and Regional Coordinator for the Caucasus at CEE Bankwatch. In particular, we will look at the human rights role in IFIs' due diligence process and discuss the identification, monitoring, and assessment of projects' risks and impacts. We will look specifically at the European Investment Bank (EIB) - "the lending arm of the EU". On 1 February, the EIB will hold its annual seminar between civil society and the EIB’s Board of Directors, with a thematic discussion on “strengthening the EIB’s sustainability framework.” 

This is the second episode in our series on the situation of Uyghurs and other minorities in Xinjiang. This time we focus on legal aspects and international mechanisms surrounding the issue. Our guest is Fernand de Varennes - Extraordinary Professor at the Faculty of Law of the University of Pretoria (South Africa), Adjunct Professor at the National University of Ireland-Galway (Ireland), and Cheng Yu Tung Visiting Professor at the Faculty of Law of the University of Hong Kong (China). Since August 2017 Fernand de Varennes has been serving as United Nations Special Rapporteur on Minority Issues.

The first episode of the series is devoted to the history of Uyghurs, China’s minority policy and relations with its Central Asian neighbors. It is available here.

The word “Uyghur” has gained popularity in human rights recently, and so has the fight for its people’s liberation from what is considered to be the biggest crime against humanity of our century. Numbers vary, but it is estimated that over one million people have been sent to internment camps in the Xinjiang since 2017.

In today’s episode we will be focusing on the history of Uyghurs, China’s minority policy and relations with its Central Asian neighbors.

Our distinguished guest is Dr. Dru C. Gladney, Professor and Chair of Anthropology at Pomona College, California.

This is the first episode in our series on the situation of Uyghurs and other minorities in Xinjiang. 

На этот раз тема эпизода – ювенальная юстиция в Казахстане. В гостях подкаста Гульжахан Абдулаева – детский врач, реаниматолог, анестезиолог в Научном центре педиатрии и хирургии, а также член национального превентивного механизма по городу Алматы и Алматинской области, и Эльвира Ватлина – директор Детского Фонда Казахстана, вице-президент международной ассоциации детских фондов и член национальной коалиции против пыток. Мы говорим о системе ювенальной юстиции с юридической, медицинской и правозащитной точки зрения, а также делимся рекомендациями для правительства Казахстана и международного сообщества. 

Сегодняшний эпизод – это вторая часть выпуска о ювенальной юстиции. Первую часть (на английском) можно прослушать здесь: https://anchor.fm/human-rights-survival-guide/episodes/Working-towards-the-future-legal-protection-of-minors-across-societies-and-jurisdictions-e157ofn

The next two episodes of our podcast are devoted to juvenile justice.

In this episode we focus on the international dimension of juvenile justice and main challenges surrounding the topic.

Our guest is Frances Sheahan - a lawyer and a child rights expert with more that 17 years experience working on children’s rights law, policy and programming.

Together we will discuss the main the international legal standards within the juvenile justice and identify the key steps that can ensure a transition towards child-friendly justice systems around the world.

Сегодня по всему миру отмечается Международный день в поддержку жертв пыток. В этом эпизоде подкаста мы беседуем с Гулчехрой Холматовой - Директором Общественной организации "Мир права" и Руководителем группы правовой помощи Коалиции гражданского общества против пыток и безнаказанности в Таджикистане, о ситуации в Таджикистане в контексте противодействия пыткам и жестокому обращению, о работе с семьями жертв пыток и о том, как помочь себе и своим близким пережить столкновение с пытками и помочь восстановить справедливость.

In this episode we reflect on legal aspects of the European Court judgment in the case of Georgia v. Russia II. Our distinguished guests are Philip Leach, a Professor of Human Rights Law at Middlesex University, a solicitor, and Director of the European Human Rights Advocacy Centre (EHRAC); and Vanessa Kogan, a Director of Stichting Justice Initiative - an organisation dedicated to the legal protection of victims of human rights violations connected to armed conflict and counter-terrorism operations, torture and gender-based violence in the post-Soviet region.

The judgment in the cases of Georgia v Russia (II) that has steered controversy, has been delivered by the European Court on 21 January of this year. It concerns human rights violations committed in 2008 in the context of an armed conflict between Georgia and Russia, which resulted in at least 400 civilian deaths, large scale destruction of civilian property and displacement of over 20.000 ethnic Georgians from South Ossetia. Systemic human rights violations continued long after the cessation of hostilities.

The most controversial aspect of it concerns the Court's refusal to extend Convention protection to events that occurred during the active phase of hostilities, from 8 to 12 August.