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Belgrade and Human Rights

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2014

Geoffrey Edwards
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Extract

IT WAS ONE OF THE MAJOR ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE WEST TO SECURE the inclusion of the issue of human rights within the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) and its Final Act. Among the Principles contained in the latter which purport to guide relations between the participating states, Principle VII refers to respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, including freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief. Basket III of the Final Act contains an extensive number of detailed practical measures allowing for the freer movement of peoples, information and ideas. These results were achieved only after protracted negotiations in drawing up of a mutually acceptable package of measures covering the whole range of issues involved in detente: the military and the economic as well as the humanitarian. The practical manner in which the Final Act brought these aspects of detente together provides a solid basis from which to assess implementation by the participating states and therefore their commitment to continuing the process of detente.

Type
Article
Information
Government and Opposition , Volume 13 , Issue 3 , 01 July 1978 , pp. 307 - 322
Copyright
Copyright © Government and Opposition Ltd 1978

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References

1 Clarity has not been aided by linguistic ambiguities: the English ‘non-intervention’ has been translated into Russian as ‘non-interference’, thereby appearing to offer very much wider scope despite the clear implication of the actual content of the Principle which refers to military intervention or military or other coercion.

2 Many of the Soviet monitoring groups’ reports have been printed for the United States Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe.

3 For a full discussion of abuses see Bloch, Sidney and Reddaway, Peter Russia’s Political Hospitals: The Abuse of Psychiatry in the Soviet Union, Victor Gollancz, London 1977.Google Scholar

4 See the White Paper on Czechoslovakia, published by the International Committee for the Support of Charter 77 in Czechoslovakia, June 1977.

5 Keston College Post-Nairobi WCC Document, Religious Liberty in the Soviet Union.

6 See Soviet Jewry and the Implementation of the Helsinki Final Act, Report of the World Conference on Soviet Jewry, May 1977.

7 Amnesty Briefing Paper on the German Democratic Republic, October 1977.

8 The proposals put forward by the British government in conjunction with other members of the European Community and/or the Atlantic Alliance are included in the White Paper, Cmnd. 7126, March 1978.

9 See The Economist 4 February 1978 for Mr Goldberg’s list of the occasions on which he had mentioned individual cases. Despite Dr Owen’s insistence that the British could follow suit if the Soviet Union proved intransigent, the British delegation appears to have stuck to condemning Soviet and East European abuses under the categories contained within the Final Act.