About This Initiative2007 Activities
Human Rights and Governance Program grantees such as the Center for Reproductive Rights, Interights, and the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights in Poland provided support and advocacy in 2007 that led to a major victory for women’s rights. The European Court of Human Rights ruled that the government of Poland had denied a woman her right to privacy by preventing her from having an abortion, despite doctors’ warnings that the pregnancy posed a threat to her health. The birth rendered the woman partially blind and unable to work. The court determined that Poland had breached the woman’s right to privacy as defined by the European Convention for Human Rights and awarded her damages.
Green Alternative, another grantee, won an important case for freedom of information and privatization accountability in Georgia. The Tbilisi City Court decided against the Ministry of Economic Development, requiring the agency to declassify documents related to the transfer of shares of a state-owned enterprise and provide Green Alternative with a copy of the privatization agreement.
In Baysayeva v. Russia—a case brought before the European Court of Human Rights by the grantee Russian Justice Initiative—the court handed down a strongly worded decision condemning the disappearances of people detained by Russian forces in Chechnya. The court ordered Russia to pay compensation for moral damages and also to take steps to properly investigate disappearances. The court’s recognition of the problem of disappearances can set a precedent for the way future cases are handled in Chechnya.
The human rights community achieved a significant victory in September 2007 when Kazakhstan signed the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture. Advocacy by OSI partners, the Kazakhstan International Bureau for Human Rights and Rule of Law, the Almaty Helsinki Committee, and the Charter for Human Rights, played a strong role in winning the government’s decision to ratify. The protocols will substantially strengthen human rights protections and remedies for violations.
