The first three months of activity of the new government in Ukraine give a possibility to analyze the main tendencies on development of situation in Ukraine, including human rights. Three months ago we addressed the President of Ukraine with a letter where we stated the position of human rights organizations regarding the changes and reforms which are to be accomplished to minimize violations of human rights in Ukraine. Actually, no one of our proposals was taken into consideration in full.

The Presidential election campaign, which is under way in Ukraine, is mired with grave violations of the fundamental human rights and basic freedoms. The recent events demonstrate that the Ukrainian authorities have resumed persecution of independently minded people, using law-enforcement agencies as a tool of the political struggle.

The Ukrainian Helsinki Union of human rights is extremely worried with recent events in Sumy. We want to point out that expression by people of any political views in a peaceful way is a fundamental value of a democratic state, and the state must do its best for the creation of proper conditions for this, no matter whether these views are oppositional or pro-power.