UN criticizes work of law enforcement bodies in Northern Caucasus

The situation with human rights and persecutions of journalists in Russia has deserved a special report, prepared by the respective profile committee of the United Nations. The results of the work of the experts of the UN Human Rights Committee were reported today in Geneva. Russian law enforcement bodies operating in the Chechen Republic and other subjects of Northern Caucasus were subjected to the sharpest criticism.

By the results of the report, eighteen UN experts have called the Kremlin to make a number of legislative amendments, including a clearer definition of notions "terrorism" and extremism", eradication of slander in relation to journalists and guarantees of observance of the rights of those who are placed to mental hospitals under court decisions, as reported by the Associated Press.

The experts have made Moscow responsible for the attacks of armed persons on peaceful citizens in South Ossetia after the August conflict and called the authorities to investigate all these cases.

Speaking about law enforcement bodies of the Chechen Republic and other subjects of Northern Caucasus, the UN experts have noted cases of torture and kidnappings, arrests under far-fetched pretexts and ordinary murders of citizens by law enforcers. The report runs that criminals "sometimes delight in their impunity."

Special charges relate to persecutions of journalists, who become in Russia, as the UN experts believe, objects of political processes, which prevent appearance of critical reports in Russian media.

Although the authors present no statistics, they indicate that many murders of journalists and human rights activists are still unopened.

The Committee has also given attention to oppressions on sexual minority, including by the militia. Human rights activists have reported prosecutions and even murders of people under the motives of their sexual orientation.

The UN experts make an unpromising conclusion about defence of human rights worldwide. As they said, the state institutes in charge of this defence fail to follow UN guidelines and are not as efficient as they should be. Human rights NGOs complain that official state structures - both executive and judiciary, and power agents, are underestimating the value of normal work of human rights defence institutes.

Among other problems, they specify the administrative and financial dependence of human rights activists on the state. The UN experts conclude that the best way out could be establishment of public funds beyond any state control for funding the operation of NGOs.

The complete report will be presented next week.