Andrew Anderson, Executive Director

Bonjour, buenos dias, dobroye utro, sabah alkhayr, good morning.

Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, and most importantly, human rights defenders,

welcome to the 2017 Dublin Platform for Human Rights Defenders.

These are hard times for human rights, but pessimists should not underestimate how resilient and powerful human rights defenders can be.

In September 2016, the man who had ruled Uzbekistan for 27 years died. As often happens when authoritarians pass on, Islam Karimov’s death after so many years in power left questions as to who would fill the vacuum, and whether the country’s new ruler would ease the repressive practices of the past regime. When Shvakat Mirziyoyev quickly emerged as the successor to Karimov, many in the international community believed that there would be some form of liberalisation.

My friend Dr Mudawi Ibrahim Adam is currently chained by hands and feet to a wall in Kober Prison in Khartoum. He has been badly beaten. He started a hunger strike on Sunday in protest at his detention without access to a lawyer since the 7th of December 2016. He was allowed a brief visit from his brothers 10 days ago, but has otherwise been denied access also to his family.