The UK is contributing €500k to the ‘International Accountability Platform’ which will collect and store evidence of human rights violations and torture
A new programme to collect, store and build evidence of human rights violations and torture against the Belarusian people is being launched today, supported by UK Foreign Office Minister Wendy Morton and our international partners.
The UK is contributing €500k to the ‘International Accountability Platform’ which will collect and store evidence of human rights violations and torture, which may in future be used in independent criminal proceedings.
It is a joint initiative led by a coalition of expert NGOs and supported by the UK, Denmark, Germany and other international partners to hold Lukashenko’s regime to account for systematic human rights violations following the rigged Presidential election in 2020.
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said:
FCDO Minister for the European Neighbourhood, Wendy Morton, said:
Victims who want to take part can contact the Platform via its webpage to submit testimony, information and documentation for confidential processing and storage. The Platform will be located at DIGNITY’s headquarters in Copenhagen and managed by human rights experts, doctors, lawyers and IT security experts.
The creation of this Platform helps deliver recommendations set out by an independent human rights rapporteur in a report following an investigation into electoral fraud and human rights violations in Belarus.
This report, issued after the UK and 16 of its international partners invoked the Moscow Mechanism at the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), confirmed that August’s Presidential election was “falsified” and exposed the full extent of human rights violations committed by Lukashenko’s regime against the Belarusian people.
Notes: The UK will continue to work with international allies to defend democracy, media freedom and human rights in Belarus. The UK calls on the government of Belarus to hold new presidential elections, immediately end its campaign of violence and repression, release all those unjustly detained and ensure independent investigations of allegations of torture.