NetNews Usenet Archive 1993 #3/NN_1993_3.iso/spool/misc/activism/progress/10328

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/* Written 11:04 am  Jan 21, 1993 by [e-mail] in igc:gn.peacemedia
*/
/* ---------- "CO Week in Moscow" ---------- */
WEEK FOR CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTION LAW IN MOSCOW

Note: While we haven't got a news report as such from our Moscow
correspondent Peter Jarman regarding the recent "week of action to
promote a Russian law on conscientious objection to military
service," we have received a memo from him which may be of use to
those following this conference.

Jim Forest / Alkmaar, Holland / January 21, 1993

==================================================

from the Moscow office of Quaker Peace and Service, the
international department of The Religious Society of Friends,
Quakers, in Britain.

REPORT OF A WEEK OF ACTION TO PROMOTE A GOOD RUSSIAN LAW ON
CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTION TO MILITARY SERVICE, JANUARY 3 TO 9 1993

The week of action consisted of a press conference in the Moscow
City Hall attended by about 50 persons; several meetings with
Russian parliamentarians and experts of parliamentary committees;
press and radio interviews; and meetings with members of Russian
organizations concerned with helping conscientious objectors or
helping to reduce violence to those young men who have been
conscripted into the military forces.

Even though the week contained only two working days, the Monday
and Friday were unexpectedly declared to be public holidays in
addition to Wednesday, the Russian Christmas Day, we achieved more
than we thought we would in raising awareness about the need for a
conscientious law on alternative service in Russia. We perceived
that there were serious contradictions and even competition
between the Committee on Defense and Security, largely controlled
by the military, and that on Human Rights within the Russian
parliament on this issue. The military faction are doing
everything they can, if not to delay indefinitely the adoption of
any law on alternative service, at least to ensure that their
draft of the law is adopted more or less in its present from. This
draft if adopted would give the main responsibility for granting
alternative service and directing the employment of COs to
military commissioners and drafting bodies. The alternative
service would be punitive as its duration would be twice as long
as that of a regular conscript and the place of employment would
be state enterprises where there is a shortage of labor presumably
because the nature of the work is dangerous and unpleasant. No
provision is made in this draft for a CO to choose to work for the
handicapped, the elderly or for the environment, for example, as
in other countries.

The press conference in the Red Chamber of the Moscow Town Hall on
Tuesday January 5 1993 took place between 11 am and 1.30 pm. About
50 persons including those from three Radio stations and a
television channel attended. There were not as many journalists
present as we had hoped but we were able to have a long interview
with a journalist from the Russian Parliaments' newspaper two days
later. He said that he found the interview sufficiently
interesting to make it available for two other papers.

Radio Russia having several million listeners broadcast several
parts of the press conference the same day, and sent another
reporter to the Quaker flat for a further interview with Steffen
Larson and Peter Jarman three days later.

The Moscow television channel showed opening parts of the press
conference in its news program, and later that day Alexander
Kalinin and Sergei Sorokin gave a fifteen minute live interview on
alternative service on another radio station.

The press conference was chaired by Quakers, Tatiana Pavlova and
Peter Jarman, and the speakers included representatives of the
Soldiers' Mothers' Organization, the Movement Against Violence,
the Russian Peace Society, the Living Ring, the Military for
Democracy Movement, Omega, an organization promoting harmonious
ethnic relations in the former Soviet Union, and Quakers.

Tatiana Pavlova emphasized the spiritual dimension of the
arguments for an alternative service.

Maria Kirbasova arranged for us to have a two hour meeting with
the chairman of the Armed Services Sub-Committee of the Russian
Parliament's Committee on Defense and Security. We subsequently
had two other discussions in the Russian White House with experts
from their Committees on Human Rights and Freedom of Conscience,
the latter arranged by Anatoli Pchelintsev of the Christian
Officers' Organization 'Faith and Courage.'

At these meetings Steffen Larson and Thomas Hackman presented
accounts of the practice of alternative service in Denmark and
Finland, leaving factual information in writing. Steffen also
presented the Committee on Defense with a 20 minute video tape in
Russian describing the life of conscientious objectors in Denmark.

The discussions were quite detailed about the terms and conditions
of COs, the reasons why tests of conscience were not now given in
Denmark and Finland, and the reasons why less than 10% of young
men choose alternative service in these countries which Russians
tend to see as a soft option compared with the harsh realities of
military conscription in Russia.

In his contributions Peter Jarman referred to Russia being almost
the only country which had alternative service a century ago. Now
at the beginning of 1993, despite several promises to adopt an
appropriate law, the one draft law seriously being considered from
the Parliament's Committee on Defense and Security is a bad one in
several major respects. In referring to these Peter said that he
supported the many people in Russia who wanted to help young men
acquire the skills of caring and compassion by working for the
handicapped, elderly or for the environment.

Postscript:

On January 18th, several of the Russians listed above from
informal organizations and Peter Jarman were given the opportunity
to address a two hour closed hearing of the Russian parliament on
the draft law on alternative service as drawn up by the Committee
on Defense and Security. Although the proceedings were controlled
by that Committee, and the chairman was the chairman of their sub-
group on the armed services, the case for adopting a law
consistent with the best of European principles and practices was
well argued. The Chairman of the Parliament's Committee on Human
Rights, Sergei Koralyov, made an impassioned plea to
parliamentarians for Russia to repay its debt to the international
commitment for the human rights undertakings it had entered into
without implementing them. He referred to commitments to adopt a
law on alternative service consistent for example with resolution
1989/59 of the UN Committee on Human Rights. A report of this
hearing will be issued shortly.

Week of action background:

We began preparing the week of action in October 1992. Alexei
Gumelevsky, Marina Koval, Maria Kirbasova, Alexander Kalinin,
Sergei Sorokin and Rusanna Iluchina in Moscow very much helped to
bring it about, and Howard Clark of War Resisters International in
London coordinated the involvement of experienced conscientious
objectors, COs, from other countries.

War Resisters International arranged for Steffen Larsen from
Denmark and Thomas Hackman from Finland, both being pacifists with
much experience in the preparation and placement of COs, to come
to Moscow at the invitation of Quaker Peace and Service's office
there, to inform Russian parliamentarians and citizens about the
principles and practice of alternative service in their countries.
Steffen has worked for conscientious objectors for over twenty
years: he is responsible for running the training school attended
by all objectors in Denmark. Thomas has a similar responsibility:
he has assisted in the training of Finnish COs for nearly ten
years, and serves on a governmental commission responsible for the
oversight of the work of COs and on the executive of War
Resisters' International, a coordinating body for COs throughout
the world. Currently about 6% of those conscripted in Denmark and
Finland are COs.

==================================================
MEETINGS OF STEFFEN LARSEN (DENMARK), THOMAS HACKMAN (FINLAND),
WITH PETER JARMAN OF THE BRITISH QUAKER OFFICE IN MOSCOW DURING
THIS WEEK.

1. Informal organizations:

Movement Against Violence, Sergei Yegorovich Sorokin, 3512082(h),
2308377(o).

Soldiers' Mothers' Organization: Maria Kirbasova, Olga Sarafanova,
Tatiana Vasilaevna Kuzmina.

Omega (Movement for Ethnic Harmony): Vera Gamolina, Viktor Popkov.
Quakers: Tatiana Pavlova, 3388191(h); Alexei Gumelevsky.

Organization of Christian Officers, 'Faith and Courage', Anatoli
Pchelintsev.

Ring of Life (Nonviolent Defenders of Democracy): Konstantin
Truevtsev.

Russian Peace Society: Rusanna Iluchina.

2. Discussions with councillors, parliamentarians and
parliamentary experts:

Russian White House: Deputy Alexei Yurevich Tsarev, Chairman of
the Sub-Committee of the Armed Services of the Committee of
Defense and Security, 2056681(o), 2054803(f). Margarita Efremovna
Petrosyan, Specialist of the Committee on Human Rights,
2055288(o). Nadejda Alexandrovna Derznovenko, 2056652(o),
2059631(o), specialist of Committee of Freedom of Conscience.
Moscow City Council: Deputy Alexander Kalinin 9466293(h), and
Deputy Natasha Kirillova 3591110(h).

3. Media interviews include: Radio Russia: Marina Gashukaya,
3038603(h), 2155829(o). 1400 - 1800; Rossiskaya Gazeta, Editor for
Military Matters, Vitali Yurevich Potapov, 2703001(o), 2770920(o);
3539538(h). The press conference held in the Red Chamber of the
Moscow Town Hall on 5th January was reported on television (Moscow
channel), Radio Russia, and in several papers.

Steffen and Thomas stayed with Roswitha and myself and we enjoyed
many hours of their company and appreciated in some detail their
work for COs.

Peter Jarman, Moscow, 20 January, 1993.

==================================================
FURTHER ACTION

Organizations and individuals in the West are urged as soon as
possible to write through their Russian ambassador to the
President of the Russian Federal Republic, Boris Yeltsin, and the
Chairman of the Russian Parliament, Ruslan Khasbulatov, requesting
that a law on alternative service be adopted by the Russian
parliament without delay. This law should be consistent with the
principles and practices adopted in other countries like Germany
and the Nordic countries. Such organizations and individuals might
wish to refer to the appeal recently read to the Russian People's
Congress:

CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTION TO MILITARY SERVICE

APPEAL TO THE PRESIDENT AND PARLIAMENTARIANS OF RUSSIA

Dear President,
Dear Members of the Russian Parliament.

We, the representatives of pacifist and religious organizations,
request you to discuss and adopt in the nearest future a law on
alternative service. [Alternative civilian service instead of the
(compulsory) military conscription].

Our country has taken up the international legal obligations to
defend the liberties and rights of Russian citizens, including the
right to exercise freedom of conscience. The right to serve
alternative duty of those citizens whose convictions do not allow
them to take up military weapons is confirmed in our constitution
(article 45). Unfortunately, unlike the Ukraine, Latvia and other
neighbors of Russia, in this country there is no mechanism of
realization of this inalienable right.

President B.N. Yeltsin of the Russian Federation has stated
several times in his speeches the necessity of this law's
adoption.  The cabinet of ministers of the Russian Federation
decided on 5th November 1991 (Number 585) to draft a corresponding
law by 1st January 1992 and to present for discussion in
parliament.  But the question has not been resolved yet. This
means that our country is trampling on the generally accepted
norms of international law and makes criminals out of young men
whose only fault is their selfless devotion to the ideals of
nonviolence, kindness and love.

Appealing to your minds, hearts, to your statesmanship, we request
you to discuss this question as soon as possible and make a
positive decision taking into account international experience [or
international practice with conscientious objection to military
service].

THE ABOVE LETTER WAS READ OUT TO THE PEOPLE'S CONGRESS OF THE
RUSSIAN FEDERAL REPUBLIC IN MOSCOW, IN DECEMBER 1992.