US report: “courts continued to place legal restrictions about freedom of association”
The 2021 annual US human rights report has been published.
The United States of America publishes the annual human rights and democracy report. It contains statistical information on human rights violations that occur in all countries in the world.
The report devotes 37 pages to Greece. The 37 pages in the Greek section of the report include violations that occurred within a year. Police, arrest, torture, judicial proceedings, violations of rights and law, prison life, refugee problem and minorities are also covered.
In the report, which includes the difficulties experienced by the Muslim Turkish Minority of Western Thrace, especially regarding the freedom of association, it is stated that Greece does not comply with the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights. The freedom of association section of the 37-page section of the report on Greece covers the legal struggle of the Xanthi Turkish Union in the international arena. It is emphasized that the courts still do not allow the establishment of associations with the words Turkish and Macedonian in their names in Greece.
The annual Country Reports on Human Rights Practices – the Human Rights Reports – cover internationally recognized individual, civil, political, and worker rights, as set forth in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international agreements. The U.S. Department of State submits reports on all countries receiving assistance and all United Nations member states to the U.S. Congress in accordance with the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 and the Trade Act of 1974.
For nearly five decades, the United States has issued the Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, which strive to provide a factual and objective record on the status of human rights worldwide – in 2021, covering 198 countries and territories. The information contained in these reports could not be more vital or urgent given ongoing human rights abuses and violations in many countries, continued democratic backsliding on several continents, and creeping authoritarianism that threatens both human rights and democracy – most notably, at present, with Russia’s unprovoked attack on Ukraine.
The Biden Administration has put human rights at the center of U.S. domestic and foreign policy. We have also recognized our nation has not always succeeded in protecting the dignity and rights of all Americans, despite the proclamations of freedom, equality, and justice in our founding documents. It is through the continued U.S. commitment to advance human rights, both domestically and internationally, that we best honor the generations of Americans who are Black, Brown, or other people of color, indigenous peoples, persons with disabilities, LGBTQI+ persons, immigrants, women and girls, and other historically marginalized groups whose advocacy for their rights and for others has pushed America toward a “more perfect union.”
President Biden has called the defense of democracy and human rights the defining challenge of our time. By convening the first Summit for Democracy in December 2021 – bringing together representatives from 100 governments as well as civil society and the private sector – he sparked global attention and vigor toward democratic renewal and respect for human rights. Participating governments made significant commitments to revitalize democracy at home and abroad at the first Summit on which we expect meaningful progress during the current Year of Action and before the time of a second Summit.
The reports paint a clear picture of where human rights and democracy are under threat. They highlight where governments have unjustly jailed, tortured, or even killed political opponents, activists, human rights defenders, or journalists, including in Russia, the People’s Republic of China, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Nicaragua, and Syria. They document abuses of peaceful protestors demanding democracy and fundamental freedoms in countries such as Burma, Belarus, Cuba, Hong Kong, and Sudan. They highlight worrying cases of transnational repression – where governments reach across borders to harass, intimidate, or murder dissidents and their loved ones – as exemplified in the dangerous forced diversion by Belarus of an international commercial flight for the sole purpose of arresting a critical independent journalist.
But they also contain signs of progress and glimmers of hope, as the indomitable will to live freely can never be extinguished. In Iraq, people cast their votes to shape the future of their country in more credible and transparent parliamentary elections than in 2018. In Botswana, a court advanced the human rights of LGBTQI+ persons by upholding the decriminalization of same-sex relations. In Turkmenistan, all imprisoned Jehovah’s Witnesses conscientious objectors to military service were pardoned, a win for freedom of religion or belief. The stability, security, and health of any country depends on the ability of its people to freely exercise their human rights – to feel safe and included in their communities while expressing their views or gender, loving who they love, organizing with their coworkers, peacefully assembling, living by their conscience, and using their voices and reporting from independent media to hold governments accountable. There is much progress to be made, here in the United States and globally. But I know that by working together in the Year of Action and using resources like the Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, we can come closer to building a world where respect for human rights is truly universal.
- FREEDOMS OF PEACEFUL ASSEMBLY AND ASSOCIATION
The constitution and law provide for the freedoms of peaceful assembly and association, and the government generally respected these rights, albeit with restrictions due to COVID-19 pandemic mitigation measures.
Freedom of Peaceful Assembly
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the government banned protest gatherings of more than 100 persons and restricted social gatherings to a maximum of nine to 12 persons. On July 14, Amnesty International published a report claiming that authorities used the COVID-19 pandemic as an excuse to issue blanket bans on protests between November 2020 and March. According to protesters, police used water cannons and chemical irritants against peaceful protesters.
In July 2020, parliament amended legislation on public open-air gatherings. The amended law requires prior and timely notification, in writing or via email, of planned gatherings to police or Coast Guard authorities and makes protest organizers accountable in case of bodily harm or property damage. Some parliament members and analysts called the law anticonstitutional and antidemocratic, arguing it infringes the right of assembly.
Freedom of Association
Although the constitution and law provide for freedom of association, courts continued to place legal restrictions on associations of persons who self-identify as ethnic Macedonian or associations that include the term “Turkish” as indicative of a collective ethnic identity (see also section 6, Systemic Racial or Ethnic Violence and Discrimination). Despite the restrictions and lack of legal recognition, ethnic associations continued to operate. On June 29, the Supreme Court rejected the petition for registration filed by the Turkish Union in Xanthi. The court cited “national security and public order” as grounds for rejection. The union responded the Supreme Court ruling violated a European Court of Human Rights ruling that it should be allowed to officially register in Greece.
You can reach the report at
https://www.state.gov/reports/2021-country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/greece/
