|
The Civic Solidarity Platform and the Helsinki
Committee for Human Rights in Serbia organized OSCE Parallel Civil
Society Conference. Each year since 2010, the conference is organized on
the eve of the OSCE Ministerial Council. It is one of the most important
international events of the civil society.
Participants in the conference adopted a document
produced by the Civic Solidarity Platform, with recommendations for the
improvement of the overall situation of human rights and fundamental
freedoms in the OSCE area. Recommendations are submitted each year to
the OSCE Troika. This year, the document was handed over to Ambassador
Dejan Šahović, the head of the Serbian OSCE Chairmanship Task Force,
Minister Raphael Nägeli, Head of the Swiss OSCE Chairmanship Task Force
and Ambassador Eberhard Pohl, the permanent representative of Germany to
the OSCE in Vienna. Recommendations were also addressed to the OSCE
institutions.
Belgrade Declaration on Freedom of Expression was also
presented at the conference, at the panel on countering extremism, hate
speech, propaganda, and supporting artistic and online freedoms. OSCE
Representative on Freedom of the Media Dunja Mijatović stressed the
importance of cooperation with the civil society and listed the greatest
challenges media representatives in OSCE participating states are faced
with.
Panelists also presented the most important
conclusions of the self-evaluation report produced by the Serbian CSO
Coalition for the monitoring of fulfillment of OSCE commitments in the
human dimension. This report is a part of the self-evaluation process of
the Serbian OSCE Chairmanship, analyzing elections, rights of Roma,
freedom of assembly, gender equality, freedom of expression, rights of
national minorities and human rights defenders.
The second day of the conference began with a session
on migrations. Representatives of civil society organizations insisted
on solidarity and human rights work with refugees on the ground and
civil society strategies for a human rights based migration policy.
Representatives of ODIHR and German OSCE Chairmanship talked about their
activities planned for 2016 in this context. German priorities for 2016
in the human rights area were are promotion of tolerance and
nondiscrimination, national minorities, freedom of expression and media
freedoms.
Civic Solidarity Platform is one of the most important
groups of independent non-governmental organizations from OSCE
participating states. More than 80 participants from over 25 countries
attended the conference, including representatives of Russia, USA, EU
member-states, post-Soviet countries and countries of the Western
Balkans. The OSCE Parallel Civil Society Conference 2015 was organized
by the Civic Solidarity Platform in collaboration with Helsinki
Committee for Human Rights in Serbia and humanrights.ch and with the
support of the Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR) the Netherlands
Helsinki Committee, Serbian OSCE Chairmanship, the OSCE Mission to
Serbia, the OSCE Mission in Kosovo, the OSCE Presence in Albania, the
OSCE Mission to Montenegro, the OSCE Mission to Bos¬nia and Herzegovina
and the OSCE Mission to Skopje.
GALLERY::: |
