Our House Invited to Help Shape a New EU Civil Society Protection Mechanism
Our House brings Belarusian human rights experience into shaping EU protection mechanisms.
The Human Rights Centre Our House has been invited to participate in a consultation by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) on the creation of a new Europe-wide Online Knowledge Hub on Civic Space — an online platform dedicated to civic space, threat monitoring and civil society protection mechanisms.
A New Stage in EU Policy on Civil Society
The creation of the Online Knowledge Hub is envisaged in the EU Strategy for Civil Society, adopted by the European Commission in November 2025.
The Strategy identifies three key areas of European policy: ensuring the effective participation of civil society in decision-making; creating an open, safe and enabling civic space; and ensuring adequate, sustainable and transparent funding for civil society organisations.
Of particular importance is the fact that the European Commission explicitly recognises not only physical threats to human rights defenders, but also administrative, financial and cross-border obstacles to the work of civil society. The challenges identified include difficulties in accessing funding and financial services, excessive administrative requirements, restrictions on cross-border activities, smear campaigns, disinformation, SLAPP lawsuits, unlawful surveillance, and the arbitrary termination or freezing of funding.
Separately, and for the first time at this level, the new EU Strategy highlights the problem of transnational repression by third countries, which particularly affects human rights defenders in exile, such as Our House. The European Commission notes that the cross-border nature of such repression creates additional obstacles when seeking protection and justice, including problems with documents, visas and administrative procedures for Belarusian human rights defenders in Lithuania.
Not Just a Database, but a Future Protection Infrastructure
The Online Knowledge Hub should bring together existing civic space monitoring systems, research, tools and protection mechanisms at national, European and international levels.
The European Commission envisages that the information collected will make it possible to identify trends and gaps in existing protection mechanisms. On this basis, further tools could be developed, including emergency assistance for organisations under threat, coordination of protection mechanisms between EU Member States, as well as administrative, legal and logistical support.
This is precisely why the current FRA consultation matters: European institutions are asking civil society organisations directly what this instrument should look like and which real-world problems it should help address.
What Our House Considers Important to Include in the Future System
For Our House, it is particularly important to draw the attention of European institutions to the situation of Belarusian human rights defenders and civil society organisations forced to work in exile in Lithuania.
Crossing the border of the European Union does not always mean the end of repression. Human rights defenders in exile may continue to face transnational pressure, digital attacks and smear campaigns, threats, problems with documents and banking services, administrative procedures, and access to funding.
The EU Strategy itself recognises this problem. It explicitly addresses the need to safeguard civil society organisations’ access to financial services and draws attention to the risks of unjustified denial of banking services.
Therefore, by participating in the FRA consultation, Our House intends to promote an approach under which the future Knowledge Hub would become not merely a library of reports and links, but a practical mechanism for early warning, documenting threats, identifying necessary assistance, and referring organisations to existing European protection mechanisms.
Particular attention should be paid to transnational repression, the security of human rights defenders in exile, digital threats, administrative and financial pressure on NGOs, access to banking services, legal assistance, and emergency support mechanisms.
For Our House, participation in this consultation is an opportunity to bring to European institutions the practical experience of a Belarusian human rights organisation based in Lithuania, working simultaneously within the European Union and with the civil society of a country where independent organisations and human rights defenders are subjected to repression.
The future European system for protecting civil society should be based on a simple reality: for a Belarusian human rights defender, repression does not necessarily end where the border of the European Union begins.
About The Author
