The Defendant: the State – The Story of the Hungarian Helsinki Committee

Thirty years ago, the governments of Europe and North America signed the Helsinki Final Act, in which they assumed obligations to respect human rights, the freedom of conscience and to safeguard the freedom of expression and the free flow of information. In 1976, the members of the Moscow Helsinki Group attempted to exercise the rights that their government had pledged to respect. They were jailed or sentenced to forced labour. The International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights was founded to on the spirit of citizens exercising their fundamental freedoms and human rights. The first major event organised by the new human rights movement took place over twenty years ago, when the Alternative Cultural Forum was organised in October 1985 in Budapest. It was about ten years ago that the Hungarian Helsinki Committee began to carry out permanent activities in the interest of protecting human rights in Hungary.

The publication The Defendant: the State, authored by historian and HHC member András Mink (Open Society Archives), is about the history of these ten, twenty, thirty years.

András Mink: The Defendant: the State. The Story of the Hungarian Helsinki Committee.
Published by the Hungarian Helsinki Committee, Budapest, 2005
ISBN 963 86959 14 9
Available directly from the HHC for 2800 HUF or 12 Euro (plus shipping costs).