On June 23rd the NGO Freedom House took the floor at the 26th session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva and delivered the following statement:
“The crisis in Ukraine demands action by the UN and member states to monitor and report on human rights in Ukraine, provide assistance to the Ukrainian government, and facilitate the protection of human rights throughout the country. […] While the Ukrainian government has made commendable progress in a very short time in creating an environment where democracy and human rights can be fully realized, including the remarkable conduct of a nationwide election that resulted in a legitimately elected new president…”
How about that… and we thought that you couldn’t have free and democratic elections in a state of civil war and or foreign meddling. Well, I guess that criterion only applies if your name is Bashar al-Assad and you happen to have won the elections. If, on the other hand, the newly-elected president happens to be a billionaire oligarch with a shady past, who will rush to do the EU’s bidding the minute he is shown to his new office, then everything is fine, as far as Freedom House is concerned.
The statement went on:
“… we are especially concerned about the ongoing threats to freedom of expression and to journalists and the media.
These conditions are in lare part the result of disorder fostered by the Russian government and Russian troops. […] The bulk of the responsibility for these violations lies among separatist groups and those who support them, including Russian groups, but also in some cases Ukrainian authorities.
Freedom House calls on illegal armed groups to immediately halt violence and on the Russian government to stop the flow of support from Russia.”
This is the link to Freedom House statement (scroll down to Chapter 29). Three months prior to that statement, Oleksandr Panteleymonov, CEO of the National Television Company of Ukraine, was beaten up and bullied into signing hiw own resignation by fascist thugs from the pro-EU-NATO-IMF Svoboda. Interestingly, this happened on March 18th, right in the middle of the previous Human Rights Council session, where Freedom House had ten full days at its disposal to take the floor and point out the situation before the end of the session. Unfortunately, Freedom House was nowhere to be found on that occasion: I guess it probably had more important things to do?