On Monday, September 30, 2024, the Warsaw Human Dimension Conference of the Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe (OSCE) begins in Warsaw, Poland. Archons Rocky Sisson and Hon. Steven G. Counelis are traveling to Warsaw for the Conference and are prepared to give presentations there on the plight of the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the necessity for the government of Turkey to grant full religious freedom to the Orthodox Christians and other religious minorities of that country.
Archon Sisson plans to speak on the Turkish and Russian threats to the Ecumenical Patriarchate; Archon Counelis’ presentation is entitled “Discrimination Against the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople.” Both of these presentations are hard-hitting explanations of why the situation of the Ecumenical Patriarchate ought to be a matter of grave concern for all governments and international organizations that profess to support the human rights and dignity of all people.
Since 2005, the Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate (AEP) has sent a delegation to the Warsaw OSCE conference every year. The 2024 Warsaw Human Dimension Conference is being held under the auspices of the government of Malta, which holds the 2024 Chairpersonship of the OSCE, with the support of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR).
It is necessary and beneficial for the AEP to be represented at this conference because it involves much more than simply the Archon delegation delivering brief speeches. The OSCE conference offers the AEP delegation an opportunity to meet with the members of the delegations from the United States State Department and delegations from other countries, and to use these meetings to advocate for the support and defense of the Ecumenical Patriarchate.
The OSCE’s annual Warsaw Human Dimension Conference is Europe’s largest annual human rights and democracy conference. It is a platform for the 57 OSCE participating nation states, international organizations and other relevant individuals and groups to take stock of the implementation of the OSCE’s human dimension commitments.
