14 January 2016

Source: HRO.org (info)

• Ryazan region  Human rights activists  Freedom of association

Ryazan Memorial Society has been named NGO of the Year by the Ryazan edition of the Novaya gazeta newspaper.

Readers of the newspaper voted on a list of organisations nominated by journalists and a group of experts drawn from the newspaper’s readership.

According to Novaya gazeta: "Over the course of the year, the Ryazan Memorial Society has found homes in Ryazan for orphans, made public areas accessible for persons with reduced mobility and continued the tradition of commemorating the victims of political repressions in a ‘Return of the names’ ceremony. It is hard to overstate the significance of the Memorial Society for public life in the region."

The Ryazan Memorial Historical, Educational and Human Rights Advocacy Society (Ryazan Memorial) is one of the best-known non-political NGOs in the Ryazan region of the Russian Federation. The Ryazan Memorial Society was founded over 20 years ago in 1989, and has since succeeded in completing over 50 projects which involve preserving memory of the past and taking action on various fronts to defend human rights and fundamental freedoms.

The Ryazan Memorial Society is currently working on projects aimed at conserving legacies of the past, advocating on behalf of orphans and disabled persons and raising awareness of human rights and legal issues.

Over the course of 15 years, the Ryazan Memorial Society has published the national, independent historical and human rights journal "Karta".

For more than 17 years, members of the Ryazan Memorial Society have worked on projects for the independent non-political Internet portal Human Rights in Russia (HRO.org), the largest and most visited Russian-language website on human rights and fundamental freedoms. The independent, non-profit and non-political Internet portal ‘Human Rights in Russia’ (HRO.org) was created and is supported by a group of private individuals including human rights activists, historians, journalists and civil society activists from various cities and countries.

Ryazan Memorial Society is a member of the association of NGOs known as the International Memorial Society.

Ryazan Memorial Society’s projects are made possible by charitable donations and grants from Russian and international foundations, private individuals and the work of volunteers.

Translated by Joanne Reynolds