President of Ukraine Approves the National Human Rights Strategy

President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky has signed Decree № 119/2021 that approves the National Human Rights Strategy. The goal is to unite the society around human rights and freedoms secured by the principles of equality and non-discrimination.

The Strategy will be implemented in 27 areas, namely:

• prevention of torture and ill-treatment
• ensuring the right to a fair trial
• ensuring freedom of peaceful assembly and association
• prevention and countering discrimination
• ensuring equal rights and opportunities for women and men
• combating domestic violence
• ensuring the rights of indigenous peoples and national minorities
• ensuring the rights of the child, environmental rights, the rights of war veterans, in particular those who took part in repelling and deterring the armed aggression of the Russian Federation in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions
• ensuring the rights of internally displaced persons and persons residing in the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine.

The strategy implementation will require a system of ensuring human rights and freedoms and activity coordination between the authorities, civil society and business sector. It will also mark progress in Ukraine’s fulfillment of its international human rights treaties, including the Association Agreement with the EU.