Lidya Yusupova, a Chechen human rights lawyer, attended the 2nd Oslo Freedom Forum and presented the real situation in Chechnya.

The Oslo Freedom Forum, the human-rights conference in the Norwegian capital, held between April 26-29, 2010. The Oslo Freedom Forum was committed to bringing together the world’s most effective human rights defenders to share their experience and expertise with an audience of global leaders. The theme for this year was “From Tragedy to Triumph: The Heroism that Changed History & Ideas for Transforming Tomorrow.” There were many speakers among Lidya Yusupova, as Lech Walesa, first President of Poland; Garry Kasparov, an opposition party leader in Russia and famous chess player; Ingrid Betancourt, the Colombian politician; Kang Chol-hwan, the North Korean defector who wrote the Aquariums of Pyongyang; Hernando de Soto, the Peruvian economist; Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York; and Jimmy Wales of Wikipedia.

Lidya Yusupova who has been called one of the bravest women in the world, made a presentation. She showed photos. One was an extraordinary shot of three children. And the children don’t look normal. They look weird. Yusupova then says, “These are not children’s faces. They are the faces of old people who have experienced bad things.” Yusupova went on to explain that these children watched their father being killed. Toward the end of her talk, Yusupova said, “I need moral, economic, and psychological support from you.”

Thor Halvorssen, the founder and president of the Freedom Forum, said that her job carries with it an extraordinarily high mortality rate: human-rights lawyer in Chechnya. Yusupova is under constant threat.