The Union of the Committees of Soldiers' Mothers of Russia (Russian: Союз Комитетов Солдатских Матерей России Soyuz Komitetov Soldatskikh Materey Rossiy) works to expose human rights violations within the Russian military.
The organization was founded in 1989. Before 1998, it was known as the Committee of Soldiers' Mothers of Russia.
The organization is often labeled as a human rights or peace organization. Among the activities the organization is involved in is educating Russian civil society on the rule of law in relation to service in the military, as well as informing society about what the armed forces should look like in a democratic society. The organization also provides free legal advice to soldiers and their families about their rights and conscription laws, as well as intervening on behalf of soldiers who are facing abuse and hazing from their superiors and other more senior soldiers (dedovshchina).
The Committee was awarded the Rafto Prize in 1995 and the Right Livelihood Award in 1996.
Famous quotes containing the words union of, union, committees, mothers and/or russia:
“Union of the weakest develops strength
Not wisdom. Can all men, together, avenge
One of the leaves that have fallen in autumn?
But the wise man avenges by building his city in snow.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)
“The old ideals are dead as nails—nothing there. It seems to me there remains only this perfect union with a woman—sort of ultimate marriage—and there isn’t anything else.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)
“Cry cry what shall I cry?
The first thing to do is to form the committees:
The consultative councils, the standing committees, select committees and sub-committees.
One secretary will do for several committees.”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)
“Most of us don’t have mothers who blazed a trail for us—at least, not all the way. Coming of age before or during the inception of the women’s movement, whether as working parents or homemakers, whether married or divorced, our mothers faced conundrums—what should they be? how should they act?—that became our uncertainties.”
—Anne Roiphe (20th century)
“In Russia there is an emigration of intelligence: émigrés cross the frontier in order to read and to write good books. But in doing so they contribute to making their fatherland, abandoned by spirit, into the gaping jaws of Asia that would like to swallow our little Europe.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)