Germany’s Chancellor has finally opened a much-delayed memorial to Roma victims of the Nazi regime. Situated by parliament, it is meant to both commemorate the dead and stress the need to protect the living from hate and prejudice

The death has been announced of Rostyslav Dotsenko, literary critic, translator, writer and former political prisoner

On the 6th anniversary of the murder of Anna Politkovskaya, rallies and remembrance gatherings have taken place in many parts of the world

It is 71 years since the Nazi’s killing of approximately 35 thousand Jewish Ukrainians at Babi Yar, then a ravine on the outskirts of Kyiv

On 5 or 6 August 1942 pedagogue, doctor and writer Janusz Korczak, together with Stefania Wilczyńska and the other staff and 192 children of Dom Sierot na Krochmalnej [the Orphanage on Krochmalna St) were murdered by the Nazis at the Treblinka Death Camp

Iryna Stasiv-Kalynets, poet, artist and former political prisoner has died at the age of 71. Active in the Ukrainian national liberation and human rights movements, she was a person of strong convictions and steadfast commitment.

70 years ago, on 22 July 1942 the Nazis began their monstrous Großaktion Warschau during which up to 300 thousand Jewish men, women and children were sent to the Treblinka Death Camp

Vasyl Semenovych Lisovy, philosopher and former dissident and political prisoner died on Friday 20 July 2012. He was 75.

Human Rights in Russia [HRO] has reported the death of Viktor Fedushchak, the Head of the Lviv Poshuk Society which is part of the International Memorial Society

Graves force any normal human being to stop and think. Yet here there are no graves. That means that on the place where an unthinkable crime was perpetrated, reflection must be transformed into particular responsibility, into enduring remembrance of what happened.

What words can bid farewell to a person whose life made it impossible to sink into misanthropic negativity and cynical hopelessness? His – in defence of political prisoners, in affirmation of freedom

Havel was the epitome of a dissident because he persisted in this struggle, patiently, non-violently, with dignity and wit, not knowing when or even if the outward victory would come. The success was already in that persistence, in the practice of "antipolitics" – or politics as the art of the impossible

Vaclav Havel, the dissident playwright who wove theater into politics to peacefully bring down communism in Czechoslovakia and become a hero of the epic struggle that ended the Cold War, has died. He was 75

Yaroslav Homza, former dissident and political prisoner, and one of the founding members of the Donetsk regional branch of the Ukrainian Helsinki Union, died on 21 September in Ocheretyno (Donetsk region)

Human rights defender, one of the editors of the samizdat “Chronicle of Current Events” and former political prisoner, Yury Alexandrovich Shkhanovich has died in Moscow at the age of 79

A remembrance ceremony took place at Jedwabne in Poland on Sunday, 70 years after Polish villagers murdered several hundred of their Jewish neighbours. "There was no Rzeczpospolita (Polska) then, yet today there is and it can still hear the never-fading cry of its citizens. Once again, I beg forgiveness (President Komorowski)

Yelena Bonner, human rights defender, publicist and widow of Andrei Sakharov, has died after a long illness. Andrei Grigorenko who conveyed the news, expresses his condolences to her family which we can only echo. She was a very special and very courageous person and her passing is a great loss.

The death was announced on 15 April 2011 of Nina Marchenko, educationalist and mother of the renowned Ukrainian journalist and political prisoner, Valery Marchenko. Nina Mykhailivna devoted most of her life to first defending her son, and then keeping his memory alive

The death has been announced of Ivan Andriyovych Hel, publicist, human rights defender, active participant in the national liberation and Greek Catholic movements from the 1960s, and twice a political prisoner.