Ukraine

The ObjectWar Campaign week of action is taking place between 4th-10th December with multiple events across Europe. With their actions, activists are calling on Russia, Belarus and Ukraine to stop the persecution of conscientious objectors and deserters; as well as calling on the European Union to protect those refusing to take part in the war in Ukraine. Find a list of events here.

45-year-old Seventh-day Adventist Dmytro Zelinsky is serving his 3-year jail term for refusing mobilisation on grounds of conscience, and is due to arrive soon in a Kolomyia prison. On 28 August, Ternopil Appeal Court acceded to Prosecutor Roman Harmatiuk's request to overturn his June acquittal. Harmatiuk did not respond to Forum 18 to say why he appealed against the acquittal. Zelinsky is preparing a Supreme Court appeal.

Call for actions from December 4, 2023 to the International “Human Rights Day” on December 10, 2023 in support of conscientious objectors and deserters from Russia, Belarus and Ukraine.

On the International Day of Peace, September 21st 2023, IFOR, WRI, EBCO, and Connection e.V. urge the involved countries in the ongoing Russian war of aggression against Ukraine to mobilise for peace instead of war, and the EU and the international community to invest in diplomacy and negotiations instead of weapons and militarism.

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Yurii Sheliazhenko, conscientious objector, pacifist, human rights defender and the Executive Secretary of the Ukrainian Pacifist Movement, has been placed under partial house arrest in Kyiv on 15th August, being accused of ‘justifying the Russian aggression’. Send an email of support for Yurii to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy using the template letter here.

EBCO, WRI, IFOR and Connection e.V. strongly condemn the fact that Yurii Sheliazhenko, a well-known conscientious objector, pacifist, human rights defender and lawyer, Executive Secretary of the Ukrainian Pacifist Movement, has been placed under partial house arrest by the Solomyanskyi District Court of Kyiv on 15 August 2023.

EBCO, WRI, IFOR and Connection e.V. strongly condemn the fact that Yurii Sheliazhenko, Executive Secretary of the Ukrainian Pacifist Movement, has been formally charged by the Ukrainian government with the crime of “justification of Russian aggression” with sole “evidence” the Statement of the Ukrainian Pacifist Movement, adopted at the meeting on International Day of Peace 21 September 2022, entitled “Peace Agenda for Ukraine and the World”.

The German antimilitarist group Antimilitaristische Aktion Berlin (Antimilitarist Action Berlin) have found evidence that Berlin’s domestic intelligence agency (“Verfassungsschutz Berlin”) is monitoring their activities.

Yesterday, 25 May 2023, at the Supreme Court of Ukraine in Kyiv, the court of cassation overturned the conviction of prisoner of conscience Vitaly Alekseenko, and ordered his immediate release from prison and his retrial in the court of first instance.

Protection and asylum for all those from Russia, Belarus and Ukraine who refuse military service Action week around the International Conscientious Objection Day

War is a crime against humanity. We condemn Russia’s war of aggression on Ukraine, which is contrary to international law and has led to hundreds of thousands of deaths and injuries and millions of refugees. Those who are sent to the front by their governments are particularly affected.

EBCO, Connection e.V., IFOR, and WRI strongly denounce the reported detention by the Russian authorities of large numbers of soldiers and mobilised civilians in a number of centres in Russian-controlled areas of Ukraine, because they refuse to participate in the war. Russian authorities are reportedly using threats, psychological abuse and torture to force those detained to return to the front.