COMMITTEE ON THE PROTECTION OF RIGHTS OF UWC AND ITS NETWORK

About the committee

The Committee on the Protection of Rights of the Ukrainian World Congress and its Network was established in October 2019 following the illegal decisions of the Office of the Prosecutor General and the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation declaring “undesirable on the territory of the Russian Federation” the activities of the UWC, with the aim to isolate the UWC from the Ukrainian diaspora in the Russian Federation. The purpose of the Committee is to contest these decisions before the courts and ensure an appropriate reaction by the international community.

Оn 18 June 2024, the European Court of Human Rights delivered a judgment deciding that the Russian Federation violated Аrticle 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights (interpreted in the light of Article 10 of this convention) in designating the UWC as an “undesirable organisation”. In this judgment, the European Court of Human Rights declared that: “the interference arising from the designation of the applicant organisations [including the UWC] as “undesirable” failed to satisfy the “prescribed by law” criterion, being both unforeseeable and arbitrary. The domestic law did not provide the applicant organisations [including the UWC] with adequate and effective safeguards against the abusive use of the unchecked discretion granted to the executive, leaving them [including the UWC] vulnerable to arbitrary designation without the means for a preemptive or meaningful challenge”.

The Court also found that there was a violation of Аrticle 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights (interpreted in the light of Article 10 of this convention) in respect of the applicants [including UWC’s former Regional Vice President and legal representative in the Russian Federation, Serhii Vynnyk], who have been convicted for their involvement with “undesirable organisations” [including the UWC].

On 20 September 2024, the ECHR informed that оn 19 September 2024 this judgment of the ECHR became final in accordance with Article 44 of the European Convention on Human Rights.