Blog post | 01-12-2022 | Ministry of Foreign Affairs

What is the Human Rights Tulip? The Human Rights Tulip is a prize that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs awards each year to a human rights defender or human rights organisation to support their important work. The winner receives a bronze tulip and €100,000. This money and the international visibility the prize creates help the winner continue and expand their human rights efforts

Viasna’s foundation

The Viasna Human Rights Center is a non-governmental human rights organisation that was founded in 1996 during mass protests by the democratic opposition in Belarus to assist demonstrators who had been arrested and their families. It now has around 100 active members.

What the organisation does

Viasna’s main objective is building a just and free society and ensuring the rights of every person without exception. In practice this means giving Belarusians advice on legal matters, exposing and documenting abuses, and providing relief to victims of political repression. The organisation is also committed to raising awareness of democracy and human rights, for example by organising conferences and seminars and publishing and disseminating information and educational material. Viasna also still actively defends the rights of political prisoners.

Register of political prisoners

Viasna supports political prisoners in Belarus by maintaining a publicly accessible register with the aim of raising awareness among Belarusian citizens and the rest of the world. And to let the Belarusian regime know that these prisoners have not been forgotten.

Setbacks

In 2003 the organisation was outlawed by the Belarusian authorities. In 2021 Viasna was raided and prominent members arrested. Many of them are still imprisoned today.

Despite this oppression and considerable setbacks, the organisation continues to work from bases throughout Belarus and from abroad, in particular from Vilnius in Lithuania.

Nobel Prize

In 2022 Ales Bialiatski, founder of the Viasna Human Rights Center, won a Nobel Peace Prize for human rights work, together with the organisations Memorial and the Center for Civil Liberties. On 8 December his organisation could also be awarded the Human Rights Tulip. There are three candidates remaining.