The UN Human Rights Council held an interactive dialogue on resolution 55/27 regarding the interim report of the High Commissioner on the situation of human rights in Belarus in the run-up to the 2020 presidential election and in its aftermath.
The Chair of the Independent Expert Group on the Human Rights Situation in Belarus, Karinna Moskalenko, delivered the opening remarks. She emphasized the worsening human rights situation in Belarus, calling on the UN member states to exert maximum pressure on the Lukashenka regime for the release and full rehabilitation of all political prisoners. Ms. Moskalenko also urged the regime in Belarus to cooperate with the expert group and other UN human rights mechanisms.
The majority of UN Human Rights Council member countries, including EU nations, fully supported initiating the work of the independent expert group on Belarus. Delegates also emphasized the Lukashenka regime’s systematic attacks on civil society, the instrumentalization of the judicial system to suppress dissent, and other aspects of the state’s failure to meet its international human rights obligations.
Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya delivered the closing remarks at the 57th session of the Human Rights Council:
“Over 1,400 political prisoners remain behind bars in Belarus. These are teachers, doctors, journalists, activists. What is their ‘crime’? They spoke the truth and dreamed of freedom.
Many of them are kept incommunicado – without the right to contact the outside world. I haven’t heard from my husband, Siarhei, in over a year. I don’t know if he is alive. We have no news about Mikalai Statkevich, Maryia Kalesnikava, Ihar Losik, and many others. Nobel laureate Ales Bialiatski is not receiving the necessary medical care.
This is psychological torture – not only for them but also for their families.
Belarusian prisons are death traps. Five political prisoners have already died in custody since 2020, including Ales Pushkin and Vitold Ashurak. We cannot wait for more deaths.
I urge the United Nations to act. Demand an end to the practice of incommunicado detention. Demand access to medical care and family contact for all political prisoners. This is not just a political issue – it is a matter of life and death.
I call on world leaders to make the release of political prisoners a priority. Speak out. Use your influence. Impose sanctions on the perpetrators. Together, we can stop this terror and bring hope back to Belarus”.
