On 31 March the first in Ukraine forum of public human rights protecting organizations «Human rights at elections» was held in the conference-hall of the hotel «Rus». The forum was organized by the Council of Ukrainian human rights protecting organizations and the Chernigiv public committee for human rights protection with the support of the international foundation «Vidrodjennia».

118 representatives of 82 public human rights protecting organizations from many regions of Ukraine, who had handed questionnaires-applications and were chosen on the competitive basis, representatives of organs of state power, international and foreign human rights protecting organizations, donor organizations and embassies took part in the forum.

In spite of the incident that occurred during the opening (it was widely elucidated by mass media), the forum successfully worked for two days.

In the course of the forum human rights protectors and guests had the opportunity to listen to the speeches of Nina Karpacheva, the ombudsperson; Ludmila Alekseeva, the president of the international Helsinki Federation of human rights, head of the Moscow Helsinki Group; George Soros, the first commissioner of the State Duma of Russian Federation in charge of human rights, head of the board of the Russian association «Memorial», Moscow.

The plenary sittings and round tables on the following topics were conducted in the framework of the forum: «Activities for the protection of human rights», «Monitoring of the observance of human rights during election campaigns» and «Educational and informational activities during election campaigns».

Besides, the meetings in the working groups were carried out:

– prevention of torture and cruel treatment, guaranteeing of the right for freedom and personal integrity;

– right for the freedom of views, consciousness and religion;

– right for peaceful assemblies;

– right for the freedom of expression of views and the right for privacy;

– opposition to discrimination. Representatives of public organizations suggested their projects and shared their experience with each other.

After the discussions 56 organizations-participants of the forum adopted the resolution and two appeals, which are published below.