Situation of Human Rights in Belarus

A/HRC/RES/61/26View PDF

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

A Resolution of the Human Rights Council, under agenda item 4 Human rights situations that require the Council's attention, published in 2026.

What other versions does this mandate have?

18 versions · 2007–2026

Year	Symbol	Title	Word length	Text similarity
2026	A/HRC/RES/61/26	Situation of human rights in Belarus	3,030	84%Compare
2025	A/HRC/RES/58/19	Situation of human rights in Belarus	2,962	68%Compare
2024	A/HRC/RES/55/27	Situation of human rights in Belarus	2,905	19%Compare
2023	A/HRC/RES/53/19	Situation of human rights in Belarus	2,286	69%Compare
2022	A/HRC/RES/50/20	Situation of human rights in Belarus	1,851	63%Compare

What subjects does this mandate have?

8 subjects

Accountability Belarus Civil and Political Rights Experts Human Rights Human Rights Violations International Obligations Special Rapporteurs

What’s in this document?

25 operative paragraphs

Welcomes the reports of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Belarus² and of the Group of Independent Experts on the Situation of Human Rights in Belarus;³

²A/HRC/59/59.

³A/HRC/60/CRP.1 and A/HRC/61/57.

Strongly condemns the widespread and systematic violations of international human rights law, among them arbitrary deprivation of the right to life and to liberty, arbitrary detentions and arrests, including incommunicado detention of individuals on politically motivated grounds or for exercising their human rights, enforced disappearance, torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, including sexual and gender-based violence, denial of due process and the right to a fair trial, failure to safeguard the rights and best interests of the child, violations of the rights to education, work and to liberty of movement and freedom to choose one’s residence, arbitrary denial of the right to enter one’s own country and violations of the rights to freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association and to equal protection of the law, as well as other violations of human rights committed in Belarus, all as reported by the Group of Independent Experts and the Special Rapporteur;

Condemns the actions of the Belarusian authorities in committing an act of unlawful interference that deliberately endangered the safety and security of a commercial passenger aircraft and the lives of all those on board in May 2021, constituting a flagrant and serious violation of the Convention on International Civil Aviation, as confirmed by the International Civil Aviation Organization;⁴

⁴International Civil Aviation Organization, Doc 10184, Assembly Resolutions in Force (as of 7 October 2022), Assembly resolution A41-1.

Strongly urges the Belarusian authorities to comply fully with all their obligations under international human rights law and:

To immediately and unconditionally release and effectively rehabilitate all those persons arbitrarily or unlawfully detained, arrested, charged or sentenced on politically motivated grounds or for exercising their human rights, to ensure the resolution of judicial proceedings upon their release and to end all forms of harassment or pressure that may result in their forced departure, deportation or deprivation of consular services;

To cease the use of force against peaceful demonstrators, of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, prosecution, harassment, intimidation, repression and forced exile of individuals solely for exercising their human rights or for performing their duties, and to ensure equal protection of and by the law;

To ensure timely and adequate medical assistance and humane conditions of detention for all persons deprived of their liberty, and to guarantee their access to independent legal assistance of their own choosing and to legal protection throughout all proceedings;

To provide substantive replies concerning claims of enforced disappearances and make available transparent, full and timely information about the fate and whereabouts of the disappeared persons;

To ensure prompt, effective, thorough, transparent, independent, impartial and gender- and age-responsive investigations, addressing the full chain of command relevant to individual criminal responsibility with a view to ensuring accountability and effective remedy in all cases of human rights violations and abuses, including through restitution, compensation, rehabilitation, satisfaction and guarantees of non-repetition for victims and survivors, as appropriate;

To take all measures necessary to ensure the full independence and impartiality of the judiciary, free from executive control and undue political interference, and protection for and the independence of the legal profession, and to uphold due process and fair trial guarantees under international human rights law for all persons in order to restore and uphold the rule of law;

To carry out a comprehensive review of national legislation to ensure that it is consistent with the international human rights obligations of Belarus and that it does not allow for arbitrary limitations or derogations, in contravention of international human rights law;

To stop the misuse of “counter-terrorism” and “counter-extremism” policies, including by immediately abolishing the lists of extremist content and of persons and organizations allegedly engaged in extremist activity, and to ensure that all aspects of State national security practice, including when aimed at preventing and countering terrorism and violent extremism, comply with international human rights law and do not serve as a basis for prosecuting civil society representatives and individuals engaged in non-violent expression and advocacy of dissident opinion;

To adopt comprehensive non-discrimination legislation and policies guaranteeing the right of everyone to equality before and by the law, including equal access to inclusive, equitable and non-discriminatory quality education, with the best interests of the child as a primary consideration;

To revoke the decisions on the forced dissolution of civil society entities and trade unions, to enter into a genuine, constructive, inclusive and transparent national dialogue with civil society and to create and maintain a safe enabling environment, both online and offline, in which civil society can operate free from arbitrary surveillance, hindrance and insecurity;

To ensure an environment conducive to the functioning of genuinely independent media, both online and offline, including unhindered access to an open, interoperable, reliable and secure Internet;

To implement a comprehensive reform of the electoral legal framework, aligning it with international standards, including following the recommendations made by the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the European Commission for Democracy through Law (the Venice Commission) and the Special Rapporteur, and to enter into a genuine and inclusive national dialogue with all elements of civil society to that end;

To stop and prevent violations and abuses of economic, social and cultural rights, including by ceasing discrimination and arbitrary dismissal from employment and education and upholding academic freedoms and the free functioning of trade unions and of cultural and representative organizations of persons in vulnerable situations in this context, as well as by ceasing discrimination against speakers of the Belarusian language;

To withdraw and prevent measures that undermine the enjoyment of any human rights, including those of Belarusians living abroad, and to refrain from acts of transnational repression that is intended to harm, silence and intimidate individuals outside the territory of Belarus, such as the Presidential Decree adopted in September 2023 ordering the consulates of Belarus to stop renewing or extending passports and limiting other consular services essential for such persons to fully exercise their rights, and to cease criminal persecution, including trials in absentia and arbitrary seizure of properties of those living abroad, and crackdowns against their relatives in Belarus;

Urges the Belarusian authorities to relaunch a national dialogue on the abolition of the death penalty and, as a first step, to introduce a moratorium on its use;

Calls upon Belarus to consider re-acceding to the individual complaint procedure under the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and to re-accede to the Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-Making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters;

Decides to extend the mandate of Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Belarus for a further period of one year, effective from the end of its sixty-second session, and requests the Special Rapporteur to continue to monitor developments and to make recommendations on ways to strengthen respect for and protection and fulfilment of human rights in Belarus, to hold consultations with all stakeholders, including civil society inside and outside Belarus, and to submit a report on the situation of human rights in Belarus to the Human Rights Council at its sixty-fifth session and to the General Assembly at its eighty-second session, including in an easy-to-read version and in an accessible format;

Also decides to extend the mandate of the Group of Independent Experts on the Situation of Human Rights in Belarus for a further period of one year, with a view to contributing to accountability and ending impunity for human rights violations in Belarus, under the same terms as provided for by the Human Rights Council in its resolution 55/27 of 4 April 2024, and requests the Group of Independent Experts to give an oral update to the Human Rights Council at its sixty-third session and to present a comprehensive report at its sixty-fourth session, including in an easy-to-read version and an accessible format, both to be followed by an interactive dialogue;

Commends the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Group of Independent Experts and the Special Rapporteur for the work and activities undertaken to date, which have been conducted in a transparent, impartial and consultative manner despite the continued lack of cooperation by the Belarusian authorities, including the lack of access to the country, and encourages the Special Rapporteur and the Group of Independent Experts to cooperate with each other with a view to promoting synergy between the two mandates;

Urges the Belarusian authorities to establish full and non-selective engagement with all United Nations human rights mechanisms, including with the Special Rapporteur, the Group of Independent Experts, all thematic special procedures and the treaty bodies, including by granting them all free, full and unhindered access to the country, providing them with the information necessary for the fulfilment of their mandates and implementing their recommendations, to ensure meaningful cooperation with and extend full and unhindered access to the Office of the High Commissioner, to implement the recommendations accepted by the State during previous cycles of the universal periodic review and to refrain from all forms of intimidation and reprisals against persons and associations for their cooperation with those bodies and mechanisms;

Requests the Secretary-General and the Office of the High Commissioner to provide the Special Rapporteur and the Group of Independent Experts with all necessary assistance and adequate human, technical and financial resources to enable the swift renewal and the effective fulfilment of their mandates.

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

What other versions does this mandate have?

What subjects does this mandate have?

What’s in this document?

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