The right to be yourself

The meeting of the Council for the Development of Civil Society and Human Rights, which was held by President Vladimir Putin on December 7, 2022 via videoconference, supplemented the provisions of the Russian National Security Concept, adopted in July 2021.

Issues of a special military operation (SVO) were discussed in a separate "bloc" and Vladimir Putin clarified much of what worries society and became the most important part of Russian and international news streams in the new conditions, a correspondent for The Moscow Post reports.

Russia today, more than ever, has to resist outright racism and aggressive Russophobia. Lies and vile fakes spread by foreign media and Western propaganda, informational fakes about what is happening in Ukraine, have become a kind of weapon turned against Russia.

Washington and other capitals of NATO countries are bursting with indignation and sympathy.

At the same time, it is not customary to notice the crimes of the Nazi regime, which was established in Ukraine in 2014, "the rights of residents of the long-suffering Donbass for eight years, as we have repeatedly emphasized, were completely ignored by the world community - the so-called world community," the president said in his opening remarks.

Blinded or deaf at once?

Vladimir Putin also said about international institutions designed to ensure, support and promote human rights. In most cases, these institutions, acting as accusers, were "blinded or deaf at once." Only after the start of the SVO did such "structures" as the UN HRC, the Council of Europe, other so-called human rights organizations suddenly "saw" and shamelessly began to demonstrate their cynical bias, the president said.

The ability of these entities to fulfill their statutory tasks was in question. Their apparent bias forced Russia to relinquish membership in a number of these organizations. In these conditions, Putin suggested, the Council for the Development of Civil Society and Human Rights "could become an effective international platform where the issues of human rights and their protection in the modern world would be discussed."

The first result of the meeting of the Russian Human Rights Council, one might say, appeared! Vladimir Putin explained that approaches to human rights issues require a comprehensive analysis, since they began to be used "to achieve completely different, far from good goals.... to destroy the sovereignty of states, to justify Western political, financial, economic and ideological dominance. "

The second task, which many Russian human rights activists have already solved, is to help the new Russian territories, to contribute to the formation of "institutions of civil society and the modern non-profit sector" there, to work for the unification of society. "As a matter of fact, this is how it happens," the president stated, completing the entry.

In the most difficult circumstances

Valery Fadeev confirmed that in the "main, most difficult circumstances" many members of the Council have repeatedly visited the SVO zone, work with refugees, interact with authorities and civil society structures in new regions of Russia, record the crimes of the Kyiv regime against civilians.

There are more than 1,800 addresses on the Human Rights Council ballot list, including "international human rights organizations, European parliaments, leading Western media." They record shelling of settlements of Donbass (Fadeev cited the figures of "arrivals"), civilians and civilian infrastructure, as well as facts of persecution of civilians, executions of Russian prisoners of war.

"We have not yet waited for a proper reaction. There are separate letters of reply from the Vatican, the Red Cross, from some MPs in European parliaments. International human rights organizations are silent, "Fadeev summed up, for some reason he did not name the number of victims among the civilian population of the Donbass republics since 2014, as well as the number of victims on the territory of two other new constituent entities of the Russian Federation.

Further, Fadeev announced "the beginning of an international dialogue on the need to modernize, reform these [international] institutions." He either did not hear Vladimir Putin or could not break away from the prepared text.

But the third result of the Council meeting in the final part of Fadeev's report still appeared - to work to protect human rights "on the sidelines of the BRICS and SCO summits," together with the Russian Foreign Ministry. The Moscow Post newspaper spoke about this in the article "Mailing List for the Tribunal."

Marina Akhmedova departed from the "text," saying to Vladimir Putin "Thank you for bringing our people home." She remembered Maria Pirogova, a deputy of the DPR parliament, who died under shelling. After the tragedy, Maria continued to receive help from residents of Donbass on her bank card. Akhmedova also said that she was "offended because you did not make decisions on the accession of Donbass," and then thanked the "also Russian" students of the DPR and LPR, as well as "good prostheses."

She also said that "Ukraine regularly" sprinkles "new territories with mines-petals" and that "components from Germany go too long to prostheses, and we have problems with our own." She also said about the problems of rehabilitation of participants in the SVO.

Rights of people "second class" and Russia

To summarize, what the president was talking about, eight years of the history of Donbass and the North Caucasus region gave the problems of protecting human rights a new dimension. For "Western partners," human rights organizations are primarily an instrument of influence on the domestic policy of Russia and other countries of the former Soviet Union. These organizations, "now we are finally convinced of this, were not created as an instrument of the struggle for human rights," Putin concluded.

"They are not that these people are considered second-class people - they consider Russia a second-class country that simply has no right to exist at all.... We will proceed from what is, "the president said, as if summing up not only what happened in Ukraine after 2014, but also a much longer stretch of Russian history. Maybe starting with the decisions that were made back in Helsinki in 1975.

"There can only be one answer here on our part: a consistent fight for our national interests.... we will do this in different ways and means, first of all, of course, we will be guided by peaceful means, but if nothing else remains, we will protect ourselves with all the means at our disposal, "Vladimir Putin confirmed this assumption.

By all available means

The conversation about human rights, the role of the West in Ukraine and the course of the SVO turned towards Russophobia with hidden and explicit forms, "trampled agreements," the borders of Ukraine and its sovereignty, mobilization, and national interests.

As well as Russia's nuclear strategy, when Svetlana Makovetskaya, director of the GRANI Center for Civil Analysis and Independent Research Foundation, among other things, asked Vladimir Putin about the threat of world nuclear war. She invited the head of state to make a statement as a gesture of goodwill that "Russia will not use nuclear weapons under any circumstances."

The President stated that the threat of nuclear war is increasing. "Due to the fact that Russia will not use the first under any circumstances: well, if it does not use the first under any circumstances, it means that the second will not use either, because the possibilities of use in the event of a nuclear strike on our territory are very limited," the president replied.

The Russian leader stressed that Russia considers nuclear weapons as a means of defense, as a possibility of a retaliatory strike, "that is, when a strike is struck at us, we strike back." And he added that "the so-called tactical nuclear weapons..." American nuclear weapons, in large numbers located in European territory.

"We did not transfer our nuclear weapons to anyone, we do not transfer them to anyone, but, of course, we will protect our allies with all the means available to us, if necessary," Putin warned, reserving the right to define the concept of "allies."

Kyiv is led by "crazy with a razor"

The president also recalled former British Prime Minister Lisa Truss, "not in the evening to be remembered," who, with her willingness to "press the button," launched a wave of fears, speculation and all kinds of Western fakes about nuclear threats, but from Russia.

'We're not going to wave these weapons like a razor, running around the world. But, of course, we proceed from the fact that it is. This is naturally a deterrent, not provoking the expansion of conflicts, but a deterrent. And I hope everyone understands this, "Vladimir Putin once again explained, assuring the participants of the superiority of Russian weapons.

The meeting of the Human Rights Council ended with a proposal to create a new history textbook and a new social science textbook. Vladimir Putin commented on this idea.

"History is generally important for any people, especially at some difficult turns in the life of the state. For us, just such a moment has come when we are obliged to be very attentive to both history and the formation of public consciousness on the basis of reliable historical data, and everything is formed, of course, from school, "he said.

Many of the participants may have thought that "reliable data" in the formation of society and its ideas about the fate of Russia are needed not only by schoolchildren, but also by other age groups, including politicians and officials, journalists and political scientists, and even diplomats.

In the life of the Russian state, there is a difficult turn and its integral part is relations with the West. We have to seriously think about this for at least the third time in the last hundred years, again in conditions of hostilities. It would be nice to rethink this newly inflamed topic no longer return. Otherwise, they can deceive again!

Photo: Kremlin Press Service