{"id":11040,"date":"2018-07-20T21:36:42","date_gmt":"2018-07-20T21:36:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/?p=11040"},"modified":"2018-08-22T20:56:14","modified_gmt":"2018-08-22T20:56:14","slug":"national-security-and-human-rights-how-to-find-a-balance-in-ensuring-public-interests","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/national-security-and-human-rights-how-to-find-a-balance-in-ensuring-public-interests\/","title":{"rendered":"National security and human rights: How to find a balance in ensuring public interests? (WS1)"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p><em>The New Europe Center continues to inform about the conference \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/neweurope.org.ua\/en\/dosvid-derzhavotvorennya-izrayilyu-uroky-dlya-ukrayiny\/\">Israel\u2019s Experience of Nation-Building: Lessons for Ukraine<\/a>\u201d that was held in conjunction with the Ukrainian Jewish Encounter on 12 June in Kyiv. Below are key theses forwarded by the speakers of Workshop \u21161, \u201cNational security and human rights: How to find a balance in ensuring public interests?\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/media\/Israel3_main.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-11043 alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/media\/Israel3_main-400x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"300\" \/><\/a>Dan Meridor, President, Israel Council on Foreign Relations, Deputy Prime Minister of Israel (2009-2013)<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0861a6;\">Certain moral norms of behavior must be upheld even during hostilities.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cAlthough it\u2019s war, there are things you cannot do. [The conviction of Israeli soldiers who shot Arab curfew violators in 1956] was not popular but it became part of what we, as soldiers, learn. We need to keep certain norms of behavior, even in war\u201d.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cIt is not enough that there are laws, it depends on the leadership. \u2026 To say to them there are limits to what you can do takes leadership, and it is very important to keep your moral character\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0861a6;\">Honoring human rights is a foundational element of a successful democracy.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cIn the end [\u2026] the nature and truthfulness of democracy is not determined by lectures in the faculty of law, but in interrogation cellars, how you interrogate people and how you fight your wars\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/media\/Andrew-Srulevitch.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-11048 alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/media\/Andrew-Srulevitch-400x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"300\" \/><\/a>Andrew Srulevitch, Director of European Affairs of the Anti-Defamation League<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0861a6;\">Critics of Israel have sought to equate Zionism with racism in the name of human rights. Over half of the UN Human Rights Council resolutions in the last decade have targeted Israel, the result of a successful Arab lobby and Iranian opposition.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cWe can acknowledge problems in Israeli society without supporting the apartheid lie\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0861a6;\">Lessons for Ukraine from Israel\u2019s experience:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cReject the lie, reject the slander, but don\u2019t claim to be perfect. It\u2019s not credible with the audience you want to convince\u201d.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cWhen your adversaries are not democracies, promote yourself in America and Europe as a democracy. People respond to the argument of a fellow democracy under threat, and that argument doesn\u2019t require your democracy to be perfect and your rule of law [to be] without problems\u201d.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cForward progress on democratic norms is important, and democratic backsliding is extremely harmful to reputations. We are seeing this in Hungary and Poland, which are losing friends in the West for those reasons\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/media\/Yevhen-Zakharov-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-11052 alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/media\/Yevhen-Zakharov-1-400x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"300\" \/><\/a>Yevhen Zakharov, Head of the Board of the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union, director of the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0861a6;\">The staged murder of Russian journalist Arkady Babchenko by the Security Service of Ukraine was an example of the state lying to its people, a situation that would be unlikely in modern-day Israel.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cUkraine\u2019s leaders allowed themselves to publicly uphold the operation, knowing well it was a fake. Israel, despite the strength of its special operations, has not resorted to having its leaders lie to their own people\u201d.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cUkraine has now normalized this type of behavior, for secret services to repeat such operations\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0861a6;\">Ukraine has yet to implement key human rights conventions it has ratified.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cUkraine ratified the United Nations Convention for the Protection of all\u00a0Persons\u00a0from Enforced Disappearances but has not done anything towards its implementation\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0861a6;\">Despite successful prisoner exchanges between Ukraine and the so-called DNR\/LNR, prisoners held by Ukraine are not being afforded their fundamental human rights. The Security Service of Ukraine has (SSU) been guilty in this regard.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cThese people are detained \u2026 in unknown places, incommunicado, with no contact to the outside world. This is illegal\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0861a6;\">Human rights and democratic norms can be a path to victory.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cUkraine can win this war only when it becomes a truly democratic state where human rights are honored; only then can it break away from Russia and declare victory over the totalitarian and paternalistic Russian state\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/media\/Oleksandr-Lytvynenko.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-11050 alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/media\/Oleksandr-Lytvynenko-400x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"300\" \/><\/a>Oleksandr Lytvynenko, Deputy Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0861a6;\"><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Ukraine\u2019s human rights situation is not a unique problem.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cAre there problems in this sphere? Yes, there are, and these problems exist across the world. Are these problems unique to Ukraine? No, they are not\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0861a6;\">Russia\u2019s treatment of the Ukrainian nation, and Ukrainians in Crimea, denies them their basic humanity.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cThe Russian leadership \u2013 and this was echoed several days ago by [President] Vladimir Putin \u2013 does not accept the existence of Ukrainians as a separate nation from Russians\u201d.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cThe situation in Crimea is such that today, repression is possible, disappearances are possible, expropriation is possible, political killings are possible\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0861a6;\">Ukraine must be self-reliant on its path to victory. Because no one else can be counted on to defend the Ukrainian state, it is up to Ukraine itself to uphold normative democratic values. By doing so, it will secure its own future.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\u201cUkraine can only be defended by Ukraine itself. Nobody owes us anything\u201d.<\/li>\n<li>\u201cWhat is victory? It is the survival of Ukraine as a free and independent democratic state which will ensure its effective development. To achieve this unchanged as a nation is impossible\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"860\" height=\"484\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/36Smi-Bx2nE?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; encrypted-media\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/neweurope.org.ua\/ukrayina-ta-izrayil-yak-pobuduvaty-sylnu-derzhavu\/\">Read the main theses of the plenary session speakers<\/a> (available only in Ukrainian)<\/p>\n<p><strong>Also see<\/strong> <a href=\"http:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/israels-experience-of-nation-building-lessons-for-ukraine\/\">the photos from the conference<\/a> <strong>and<\/strong> <a href=\"http:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/sessions-video-israels-experience-of-nation-building-lessons-for-ukraine\/\">videos of all the Workshops<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The New Europe Center continues to inform about the conference \u201cIsrael\u2019s Experience of Nation-Building: Lessons for Ukraine\u201d that was held in conjunction with the Ukrainian Jewish Encounter on 12 June in Kyiv. Below are key...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11041,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[140,19,60],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11040","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-israels-experience-of-nation-building-lessons-for-ukraine","category-uje-initiatives","category-symposia","primary-category-19","primary-category-uje-initiatives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11040","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11040"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11040\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11372,"href":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11040\/revisions\/11372"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11041"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11040"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11040"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ukrainianjewishencounter.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11040"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}