Moscow Helsinki Watch Group
| Московская Хельсинкская группа | |
 |
|
| Formation | 12 May 1976 |
|---|---|
| Founder | Yuri Orlov and others |
| Type |
Non-profit NGO |
| Headquarters | Building 22/1, Bolshoy Golovin Lane, Moscow 103045, Russia |
| Fields | Human rights monitoring |
|
Chair (1976–1982)
|
Yuri Orlov |
|
Chair (1989–1994)
|
Larisa Bogoraz |
|
Chair (1994–1996)
|
Kronid Lyubarsky |
|
Chair (1996–)
|
Lyudmila Alexeyeva |
|
Parent organization
|
Helsinki Committee for Human Rights |
| Subsidiaries | Working Commission to Investigate the Use of Psychiatry for Political Purposes |
| Website | |
Today the Moscow Helsinki Group (also known as the Moscow Helsinki Watch Group, Russian: Моско́вская Хе́льсинкская гру́ппа) is one of Russia's leading human rights organisations. It was originally set up in 1976 to monitor Soviet compliance with the Helsinki Accords and to report to the West on Soviet human rights abuses. It was forced out of existence in the early 1980s, but revived in 1989 and continues to operate in Russia today.
In the 1970s Moscow Helsinki Group inspired the formation of similar groups in other Warsaw Pact countries and support groups in the West. Within the Soviet Union Helsinki Watch Groups were founded in Ukraine, Lithuania, Georgia and Armenia, as well as in the United States (Helsinki Watch, later Human Rights Watch). Similar initiatives sprung up in countries such as Czechoslovakia with Charter 77. Eventually, the Helsinki monitoring groups inspired by the Moscow Helsinki Group formed the International Helsinki Federation.
On 1 August 1975, the Soviet Union became one of the 35 nations to sign the Helsinki Accords during the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe in Helsinki, Finland. Although the Soviet Union had signed the Accords primarily due to foreign policy considerations, it ultimately accepted a text containing unprecedented human rights provisions. The so-called "Third Basket" of the Accords obliged the signatories to "respect human rights and fundamental freedoms, including freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief." The signatories also confirmed "the right of the individual to know and act upon his rights and duties in this field."
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