After the historical move by Brussels to impose sanctions on China, Beijing retaliated by targeting four Lithuanian politicians among over a dozen European diplomats and officials. Now, despite direct pressure on Lithuanian MPs, Vilnius is planning to recognise repressions against the Uighurs as genocide.

The issue of granting parental rights to same-sex partners has become the most important fight for equality in modern day Latvia. As parliament prepares to decide on key amendments to the country’s constitution, Latvians are struggling to understand that their freedom should not infringe on the freedom of others.

No one embodies the individual and collective fight for one's liberties and freedom in modern-day Latvia as much as Evita Goša. When her fiancée found out she was not entitled to a ten-day paid leave usually granted to fathers of new-borns, she petitioned the Constitutional Court of Latvia which agreed to hear the case.

Paid surrogacy and the practice of egg donation remain unresolved regulatory issues in both Poland and Ukraine.

Ethnic cleansing, the abuse of civilians and prisoners of war, and cultural vandalism are well documented features of the wars over Nagorno-Karabakh.

A conversation with Basil Kerski, director of the European Solidarity Centre in Gdańsk. Interviewer: Iwona Reichardt

IWONA REICHARDT: With 2020 behind us, we are now entering into the third decade of the 21st century. There is a sense that the beginning of each decade can indicate a certain change which determines the years to come. 1989 and 1991 marked the beginning of a new post-Cold War order; the first decade of the 21st century was marked by the terrorist attacks on September 11th 2001; while the second decade of this century started a bit earlier, with the 2008 financial crisis. This time we have the COVID-19 pandemic which started in 2020. In a way, all of these events were surprises as well….

BASIL KERSKI: It is hard to say whether decades are a good measure to describe political and economic phenomena, but let's say that this is some sort of ordering perspective. We must distinguish between two things. First, the breakthrough events are always preceded by some processes that are visible and predictable. Only then, do we see their effects. When it comes to 1989 and 1991, I think that the process that everyone had expected was the democratisation of Central Europe.

The Russian-controlled east Ukrainian separatists have been operating a small concentration camp in the city of Donetsk, Ukraine for more than six years now. Outside any regular jurisdiction, men and women are being physically and psychologically tormented on a daily basis, in ways reminiscent of Europe’s darkest times.

On July 29th Belarusian security agents in Minsk seized Vitali Shkliarov, a Belarusian-born US political strategist and critic of Alyaksandr Lukashenka’s authoritarianism. As he was being taken, he managed to make a one-word post on Telegram: “Arrested”.

An interview with Kara K. Hodgson, PhD candidate at the Arctic University of Norway. Interviewer: Mario Giagnorio.

Interview with Alim Aliev, a program director at the Crimean House. Interviewers: Iwona Reichardt and Margarita Novikova.

As we commemorate the 30th anniversary of the events that led to the reunification not only of Germany, but also of Europe, we would be wise to recall the cautionary message of those who sacrificed their lives on Tiananmen Square.

Smith Freeman and Olivia Capozzalo of the She’s In Russia podcast interviewed Yulia Gorbunova about the latest Human Rights Watch report.

Turkish academic Mahmut Çınar was recently blacklisted from his professorship because he signed a petition in support of rights for Kurdish populations. He defended himself against the accusations of terrorist propaganda in the Turkish High Court. This is his statement of defence.