An appeal to the new Federal Government: No restraint in questions of human rights!

On occasion of the Human Rights Day, the Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) sends an appeal to the new Federal Government to show commitment for human rights issues – especially regarding Germany's strategic partner countries. "Human rights are indivisible. They apply all over the world; in Russia, China, Vietnam, Turkey or Iran. President Joachim Gauck's decision not to pay a visit to the Winter Olympics in Sochi is a wake-up call for other politicians in Europe not to ignore or gloss over human rights violations in Russia."

"Germany's foreign policy should show no restraint," demands the STP. It is worrying that – after the coalition negotiations – the SPD boasted to have enforced that the German foreign policy towards Russia, Turkey and Iran will be more "cooperative" rather than "confrontational" in future. "It is not an act of confrontation to remind repressive states of their obligations of international law. If the international human rights conventions were not binding, they would not make any sense and would merely be empty phrases."