September 2014: Burnt out rocket launchers and the remains of munitions lie amongst the rubble of a Ukrainian Armed Forces field camp near Dmitrivka in the north of Lugansk Oblast, Ukraine. (c) Jan A. Nicolas/DPA/PA Images. All rights reserved.
Human rights don’t exist in a warzone. The conflict in Ukraine’s Donbas region is now in its fourth year. Ukrainian civil society, human rights activists and international organisations such as the UN and OSCE are trying to solve and stabilise the situation. But despite the fact there is only one conflict, there are different views on how to resolve it. There are also different views regarding the territories controlled by illegal armed groups under the guise of the so-called “Donetsk People’s Republic” and “Luhansk People’s Republic”.
Currently, the OSCE and UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission operate in the territory of Ukraine’s Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO) in the Donbas. The UN’s mission is to monitor the general situation in the ATO zone. The OSCE monitors and records violations in the Donbas, as well as acts as a mediator in negotiations. According to Ukrainian human rights defenders who regularly travel to the conflict zone in order to document human rights violations, representatives of the OSCE don’t always record instances where Ukrainian sovereignty is violated, as well as evidence of Russian state aggression. What is the reason for this: a lack of desire to recognise the obvious fact of war? Or is it something else?
