Annual Report 2024

As I am writing my chair’s comments this year, it seems we are going through a paradigm shift in the concept of world security.  There may no longer be a sufficiently deterring guarantee behind NATO’s Article 5 to protect vulnerable states in Europe. It’s deeply concerning that there are leaders in the free world failing to distinguish between the attacker and the attacked. Thus, vital support to those who have been attacked – to Ukraine – has been withdrawn, including support to essential civil ends.

This is making Europe stronger together for Ukraine. That’s why it’s more necessary than ever to show our support for Ukraine in all kinds of different ways. The NHC’s way is to support civil society in its fight for freedom and independence and to work for the maximum efficiency of the economic sanctions against Russia. 

In the autumn of 2024, we received grants from the Norwegian government’s Nansen Support Programme for Ukraine for our work supporting civil society in Ukraine.  This involves our work with the impressive Ukrainian organisations I met in Kyiv this January.  The Nobel Peace Prize laureate, the Centre for Civil Liberties as well as Truth Hounds and Media Initiative for Human Rights.  They are documenting war crimes and grave violations of human rights. In 2024 alone, more than 4000 entries on almost 5000 victims were registered in the NHC analytical database I-DOC. 

We are now working to scale up our documentation work by improving the documentation system, which is developed by the Case Matrix Network (CMN). This will make it more user-friendly and more efficient to collect data, ensuring that more perpetrators face prosecution. 

Western components are still found in debris from Russian weapons in Ukraine, indicating that such components are reaching Russia through third countries.  That must not be allowed to continue, and our sanctions project, in cooperation with Corisk, is continuing with full force.  They are doing important work to disclose those who are behind these violations, to put an end to these circumventions of the international sanctions, and to prevent Western actors from supporting the Russian arms industry and the war economy. 

Ukraine is not only fighting a war, but also actively combating corruption, a serious hindrance for human rights and the rule of law. In 2024 we worked with Ukrainian anticorruption experts to facilitate the exchange of experiences with Norwegian authorities, our legal system, universities and businesses.  

Beyond the war in Ukraine, we provide support for those who still fight for a democratic Russia, we directed the focus on human rights in Azerbaijan during the COP29 climate conference in Baku, and we have further strengthened our efforts for political prisoners in Belarus, just to mention but a few of the other focus areas. 

Our knowledgeable staff is an important source of information for the media.  Solid, real information is more important than ever in an era where “alternative facts” are reaching all the way into the Oval Office, proving a threat to democracies worldwide. This only underlines the relevance and the importance of the high-quality work of the Norwegian Helsinki Committee.  We stand with Ukraine, and we stand for the protection of human rights and the rule of law all over the world. 

Ragnhild Astrup Tschudi
Chairperson of Board