This year’s Human Rights Day will be marked by online actions, which Libereco and Reporters Without Borders Switzerland are calling for.

Swiss Members of Parliament

On Human Rights Day, the Swiss MPs in front of the Federal Parliament in Bern, who have taken on a godparenthod for political prisoners in Belarus, took part in a photo campaign to show their solidarity to Belarus. As part of the Libereco campaign #WeStandBYyou, more than 90 MPs from several European countries have already taken on godparenthood, including 10 Swiss MPs.

Since the rigged presidential election in Belarus in August 2020, thousands of people have been demonstrating on the streets across the country. The demonstrators are demanding the resignation of ruler Lukashenka and new democratic elections. The ruling regime reacts to the peaceful protests with massive violence and more than 30,000 arrests. Over 150 long-term political prisoners have been in jail for months – among them the Swiss Natallia Hersche, who was sentenced to 2.5 years in prison on Monday. Hundreds of cases of torture have since been documented.

Members of German Bundestag

Boundless brutality against the own people

Lars Bünger, President of Libereco Switzerland, states on the occasion of Human Rights Day: “The pictures and reports that have been reaching us from Belarus for months are shocking and upsetting. There must be no place in the middle of Europe for a regime that oppresses its own people with boundless brutality. On Human Rights Day and beyond, we want to tell the people of Belarus that we will not forget them and stand firmly on the side of those whose human rights are being violated. We will not look away and will not accept the brutal violence of the criminal Lukashenka regime. We demand the immediate and unconditional release of all political prisoners in Belarus”.

Independent media workers who report on the protests and violence of the regime are also persecuted, intimidated or arrested. According to the Independent Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ), over 500 cases of violation of journalists rights have been registered since the protests began. More than 20 media representatives are currently being detained.

Vigil in Greifswald

“The rights of the media and media workers are being massively violated in order to prevent the protests from being reported”, says Bettina Büsser of Reporters without Borders (RSF) Switzerland: “Journalists are arrested, mistreated and sentenced to prison. Belarus has also revoked the accreditations of foreign media workers, obstructs critical Belarusian media and restricts or even blocks access to mailing services and online news sites. RSF demands that the UN condemns these massive interventions in freedom of information”.

With an online action on Libereco’s website it is possible to send Christmas and New Year’s greetings to political prisoners in Belarus. Libereco has also just launched an online petition in support of persecuted students in Belarus together with the Students Solidarity Alliance Belarus.