For a better protection of people

Dear readers!

Last year saw the publication of the first Bulletin of the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights. It featured such important legal instruments as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and the Law On the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights. For us it is gratifying to realize that, apart from Members of Parliament, lawyers, law enforcement officials, journalists and scientists, the Bulletin has also stood in good stead to many Ukrainian citizens.

The appearance of the long expected human rights protection institution of the Commissioner has had a tangible impact on the moral and psychological climate in Ukraine and people began to feel to be more protected. Almost every letter addressed to the Commissioner is a soulful plea for help: “Your are our last hope…” Significantly, no longer do people feel lonely in asserting their rights and they are regaining confidence and hope, for there is someone they can turn to with their pain and complaints against an indifferent or outrightly self-interested official.

Since the establishment of the Commissioner’s Office, more than 100,000 persons addressed it. Among them were not only Ukrainian citizens, but also foreigners and refugees. We are trying to help everyone who is in need of our protection. Within this short period of time we had to stand up for the rights of the Chornobyl cleanup operators, miners, orphaned children, war veterans, invalids, pensioners, imprisoned, save our seamen held hostage abroad, and liberate Ukrainian women sold into slavery.

From its outset the day-to-day operation of the Commissioner’s Office was attended with extremely straitened circumstances: for a long time we lacked funding and premises for work, for which reason there was no possibility to enroll skilled personnel, and the little staff we had was working in two shifts. However, we were always buoyed by our faith. Your letters and petitions helped us to gain a deeper understanding of the broad spectrum of human rights issues.

For the first time in Ukraine’s history we managed to conduct under extremely difficult circumstances a unique monitoring of the situation that prevails in the compliance with and protection of human rights. Very soon the Commissioner will present to the Ukrainian Parliament a report – On the Situation in the Compliance with and the Protection of Human Rights and Freedoms in Ukraine – in which the findings of the monitoring will be reflected. The materials in the Bulletin are to a certain extent documentary elements of this report. The facts and conclusions in the report are to produce a substantial impact on the legal awareness and sentiments of society and arouse the conscience of the nation.

It is our hope that you will become our associates in the great and noble cause of asserting the supremacy of human rights protection.

Wishing you all the best - Nina KARPACHOVA