Human rights in the Soviet Union and on freedom of peaceful assembly and of association in Eastern Europe
- Author(s):
- Parliamentary Assembly
- Origin
- Assembly debate on 27 September 1980 (13th Sitting) (see Docs. 4581Docs. 4581 and 4582, reports of the Committee on Relations with European Non-member Countries). Text adopted by the Assembly on 27 September 1980 (13th Sitting).
- Thesaurus
The Assembly,
1. Recalling its
Resolution 718 (1980) on the arrest and forced exile of Dr Andrei Sakharov, in which it expressed serious concern about "the fate of all those in the Soviet Union who raise their voices in the defence of human rights and of the law" ;
2. Considering that the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of a state cannot be invoked where the protection of human rights is concerned, and rejecting Soviet arguments to the contrary put forward in order to prevent a state signatory to an international instrument from exercising its rights to ensure that the other signatories are fulfilling their obligations thereunder ;
3. Alarmed by the evidence that the Soviet authorities are stepping up measures of repression with a view to wiping out all forms of dissidence in the shortest possible time, and deploring that these measures are directed particularly against groups monitoring the Helsinki Final Act, defenders of the rights of ethnic minorities, religious communities, campaigners for workers' rights, prospective emigrants, feminist groups and others ;
4. Concerned by the repressive measures taken against free trade unionists, which include police harassment, forced exile, disappearance of persons and internment in psychiatric hospitals ;
5. Welcoming the concessions, in conformity with the Polish Constitution, won by the Polish workers- as well as the peaceful manner in which they were achieved- over the full range of their demands, extending beyond the right to organise independent, freely elected trade unions to basic freedoms of communication and information, including guaranteed access to the media for the churches, and expressing the fervent hope that all agreements reached will soon be implemented in full ;
6. Protesting against the ill-treatment to which persons are subjected on arrest and during detention, and particularly against the abuse of psychiatry for political purposes,
7. Invites the governments of the Council of Europe member states :
- to take a common stand in insisting that respect for human rights, as proclaimed in the International Covenants on Civil and Political Rights and on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and in the Helsinki Final Act, is indispensable to understanding and confidence between nations and is therefore a major factor of détente and an essential prerequisite for progress on East-West co-operation in all fields ;
- to urge the governments of Eastern Europe to respect freedom of trade unions, guaranteed by the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and by Conventions :
7.2.1 No. 87 concerning freedom of association and protection of the rights to organise, and
7.2.2 No. 98 concerning the application of the principles of the rights to organise and to bargain collectively,
of the International Labour Organisation, all of which have been ratified by the states in question ;
- iii. to seek world-wide support within the United Nations for the conclusion of a convention to prevent and punish the abuse of psychiatry for political purposes
- to urge the Government of the USSR, as a gesture of goodwill, to authorise observers from Council of Europe member countries to attend criminal trials before Soviet courts ;
- to urge the Governments of the Soviet Union and of Eastern Europe, as a gesture of goodwill with regard to the CSCE Review Conference in Madrid, to release all imprisoned members of Helsinki monitoring groups.
