Human rights

Well-known human rights defender, lawyer, and former political prisoner Rasul Jafarov intends to run for the next parliamentary elections with the REAL party – only if the regime allows him to. An interview

More than 100,000 migrants and refugees are still present in Greece. Many of them live in refugee camps, which are not appropriate accommodation solutions because of their location in faraway, poory connected areas

It was a rather hectic year in 2019 in Azerbaijan, President Aliyev decided on a series of changes, layoffs and replacements of senior officials. For some a wave of reforms, for others yet another make-up, in view of the early parliamentary elections of 9^th February

A new wave of protests is expected to mark the beginning of 2020 in Albania. With a fragmented opposition and a non-representative Parliament, civic protests may serve as a catalyst for further democratisation and freedom of speech

Today we want to dedicate a post to the eQualitie team, that has been protecting Osservatorio Balcani Caucaso Transeuropa since 2013, when our website was subjected to repeated ddos attacks and hackers asked for the removal of "inconvenient" articles, threatening to completely obscure our service to the readers

Equality bodies are national institutions that tackle discrimination in society. Building on Equinet data, we have developed for EDJNet an Index to assess their effectiveness.

After the victory in the last elections, New Democracy has given a new course to policies for migrants and refugees, which risks further weakening the protection mechanisms available to them

It has operated for over ten years alongside Ukraine's LGBT+ community. A meeting with some Insight activists and their views on Ukrainian society and the slow progress on rights in post-Soviet Ukraine

Over the last twenty years, European directives have facilitated the creation of equality bodies. The majority of these institutions are still not very familiar to European citizens, but there are some exceptions in south-eastern countries

Turkish authorities have re-arrested the internationally-known Turkish novelist Ahmet Altan just one week after his release from over three years in detention. OBCT, ARTICLE 19 and the undersigned organisations said that his re-arrest on 12 November was an extraordinarily low blow in a case that has been marked by political interference and arbitrariness from start to finish.

According to the World Health Organisation, the seven INSPIRE strategies are the most effective in reducing violence against children. ChildPact and its members surveyed 296 child focused organisations and institutions across South-Eastern Europe and the Caucasus to find out who's working on the INSPIRE package

OBCT is among the founders of ECPMF, a media freedom centre based in Leipzig – just where the demonstrations that would lead to the collapse of the Wall started in October 1989. Thirty years later, one of the slogans of that revolutionary autumn has become an angry claim on the electoral posters of the far-right AfD party

More than 11,000 retired Croatian are still working. Some of them seek a more active life, but the majority lives on the brink of poverty without any other option other than to keep working – a problem in common with many other European countries

According to the decision in the third hearing in the case Gezi Park, Osman Kavala has to remain behind bars. OBCT joins other international organisations to call for his release. The full text of the statement

The Turkish philanthropist Osman Kavala is in jail for more than 700 days. He's accused of trying to overthrow the government and to have financed the Gezi Park protests in 2013. However, there is no convincing evidence against him

While Croatia may be a paradise for tourism, actually living and working there is a lot more difficult. Croatian workers move abroad in large numbers: a phenomenon rooted in a combination of both long-term and short-term factors. An analysis

Less than two months after acquittal in the first instance, two journalists and an activist find themselves accused of "terrorist propaganda": Erol Önderoğlu, Ahmet Nesin, and Şebnem Korur Fincancı will have to face the appeal trial

On July 25^th, 1992, 150 civilians were killed in the Bosniak village of Zecovi, a few kilometres from Prijedor. Among them 29 relatives of Fikret Bačić, who returned to Bosnia at the end of the war to search for their bodies and bring those responsible to trial. On the day of the commemoration of the massacre, we collected his testimony

OBCT and the undersigned organizations call on the Montenegrin authorities to acquit investigative journalist Jovo Martinović, convicted for marijuana smuggling and criminal association and sentenced to 18 months in prison despite overwhelming evidence that his only links with organized crime were those of a reporter

Huge participation, no accidents, visibly moved participants. And from the stage, the first Pride of Sarajevo is dedicated to all the oppressed of Bosnia and Herzegovina

In 2008, the first LGBT public initiative in Bosnia and Herzegovina suffered a harsh aggression which caused 15 injured and the cancellation of the event. On September 8^th, the opportunity is coming to overcome this trauma, with the country's first Pride

Domestic violence in Armenia is unfortunately still socially accepted. Fortunately, however, institutions are starting to address the problem. The story of Gayane

Every year, in Ptuj, Slovenia, a poet writes a "letter to Europe". This year it is signed by Ilija Trojanow, writer, translator and publisher

A daily occurrence in Balkan newsrooms and a risk factor for press freedom according to international bodies, online harassment against women in the media is on the rise everywhere

The Zagreb government is determined to soften the requirements for obtaining Croatian citizenship, with an eye on intercepting the diaspora. But there are those who feel discriminated against: the case of Milan Škorić and the 5,000 without nationality

Following the Russian occupation of Crimea, the Tatar community is under great pressure. An analysis of the situation through historical digressions and a meeting with the Tatar representatives recently elected in the Ukrainian parliament

Disappointment and anger among the victims' associations for the ruling of the Dutch Supreme Court on the Srebrenica events of July 1995. The court has ruled that the state had "a very limited responsibility" for the death of about 350 Bosnian Muslim men

Age discrimination in Armenia's labour market is a serious problem, as witnessed by Karine, Karen and Anna. However, a bill that would change the situation is being discussed in the National Assembly

OBC Transeuropa and 20 other human rights and freedom of expression organisations condemn a Turkish pro-government think-tank’s report that accuses leading international media of being biased against the government and singles out their correspondents for attack. The organisations regard the report as a dangerous escalation in the harassment of journalists.

Srebrenica genocide did not happen by accident and began well before its full horror became visible. It took shape with public discourse that dehumanised the Other