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ADF, established in 1980, is a non-profit private voluntary organization dedicated to assisting the international development of democracy. It works in partnership with nongovernmental organizations committed to strengthening democratic values and processes. ADF currently works in five program areas: NGO institutional development, civic education, human rights, rule of law/legal assistance, and decentralization/local government. Since 1993, ADF has been providing technical assistance and subgrants for the institutional development and program activities of the Moscow Research Center for Human Rights, an umbrella organization of approximately fifteen human rights organizations established in 1991 to collectively promote human rights and improve the rule of law throughout the Russian Federation. Among the Center's members are: Moscow Helsinki Group, a human rights organization; Mothers Rights Foundation, which protects the interests and rights of parents of military personnel killed during peacetime military service; Society for the Defense of Convicted Businessmen and Economic Freedom, which serves citizens of the former USSR who were convicted of economic crimes or imprisoned for engaging in various forms of commerce, trade or business outlawed by the Soviet criminal code; and Fathers and Sons, which protects the rights of fathers and their children in issues of custody and visitation, makes proposals to the Marriage and Family Code of the Russian Federation to give equitable consideration to the rights of fathers, is involved in legal work to protect orphans, and provides humanitarian assistance to children. ADF has received grants totaling $849,918 from the Joyce-Mertz-Gilmore Foundation, the National Endowment for Democracy, and the United States Agency for International Development in support of its work with the Moscow Research Center for Human Rights. In April 1995 ADF was awarded a $601,918 USAID-funded grant through IREX's Institutional Partnerships Project to: strengthen ADF's partnership with the Center; increase public understanding of human rights and government accountability; and to enable the Center to extend its geographic outreach through the organization of a network of regional human rights groups in the cities of Apatity, St. Petersburg, Vladimir, Lipetsk, Rostovon on the Don, Krasnodar, Nizhny Tagil, Chelyabinsk, and Krasnoyarsk.
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