On 5 November, diplomats, representatives of the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and international experts on human rights gathered in Geneva to hear the assessment of Ukrainian human rights defenders of the human rights situation in Crimea and eastern Ukraine.

The event, which was attended by Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights, Head of Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people and a representative of the Kharkiv Human Rights Group, focused on the situation of human rights in Ukraine.

The Ombudsperson Valeriya Lutkovska mentioned specific cases of human rights violations in the east of the country and at the occupied territories of Crimea and Sevastopol City. In particular, she drew attention to illegal transfer of Ukrainian orphans from Lugansk and Donetsk to Russia facilitated by Russian border guards, closing down Mejlis, cases of forced disappearance and further tortures of Crimean Tatar activists, and extracting Crimean Tatar language books from all libraries in Crimea. The assessment of the systemic violations of ethnic minorities’ rights, particularly Ukrainians and Crimean Tatars, in the occupied territories was also given by the head of Crimean Tatar Mejlis Refat Chubarov, who had been denied entry to Crimea.

Human rights lawyer and representative of the Kharkiv Human Rights Group Gennadiy Tokarev gave an overview of human rights violations on the conflict territories of Donetsk and Lugansk regions. In his presentation he paid special attention to such crimes as kidnapping, holding hostages, torture and murder of journalists, participation of Russian military in the armed conflict, attacks on civilians during the armed conflict, violations of children's rights by illegal armed groups, as well as IDPs problems.

All the speakers extended request to the representatives of the diplomatic missions to take all the measures to settle the conflict and prevent further escalation of human rights violations in Crimea and the east of the country.

The event was organized by the Human Rights House in Geneva with the support of the UNDP project "Democratization, Human Rights and Civil Society Development in Ukraine".