Youth Human Rights Group Karelia (YHRG)

Qui sommes-nous

The Karelia regional branch of the public, inter-regional youth volunteer organization Youth Human Rights Group (YHRG) is an independent, non-governmental, non-commercial, non-political organization, registered on 29 June 2000 in Petrozavodsk.

Our mission is the protection of human rights and building of a just democratic open civil society in Russia.

Main purposes of our activity:
• to contribute to the realization of human rights protection programs and support human rights protection movement;
• to support actively and realize youth education projects;
• to contribute to the development of non-profit human rights protection organizations and civil initiatives, in first place, those youth-oriented and proposed by youth;
• to maintain educational and civil activity for the prevention of the actions of fascism, nationalism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, chauvinism, extremism, nazism;
• to encourage the development of intellectual, cultural and spiritual potential of youth;
• to support actively anti-militarist, tolerance and peace movements;
• to defend democratic values.

Activists and volunteers took part in numerous training sessions, conferences, competitions, and conducted their own activities. They published a newspaper and a collection of articles, entitled "Democracy is My Choice", and also some books.

Projects
• Civil Reception: Organization volunteers offered free legal assistance on the subjects of human and civil rights violation.
• Resistance: Drawing public attention to the problems of the proliferation of misanthropic nationalist prejudice in the society.
• Lessons in humanistic democratic tolerant consciousness given to schoolchildren of Petrozavodsk.
• School of Honest Journalism: Youth had a chance to get familiar with the basics of journalism and express their opinion in the pages of the bulletin Zero Hour.
• Lessons of Holocaust: a way to tolerance and civil activity. On material of Holocaust history the audience was told of the importance of human rights maintenance and protection of democratic values.
• All Different-All Equal: The goal of the project is to counter xenophobia, islamophobia, romaphobia and homophobia.
• YHRG Internet TV: In the situation where freedom of speech is restricted we have found a way out. YHRG has created its own TV on the Internet. On our website we post videos, films interviews filmed by YHRG activists.

Maxim Efimov is the Director of the Karelian regional branch of the inter-regional Youth Human Rights Group (YHRG).

For other net participants we can offer an expert guidance through trained staff, give an expert opinion, procure expert information and establish new contacts in the field of our work.