Seven human rights fighters receive top UN awards

The United Nations General Assembly today awarded its top human rights prize to seven global advocates ranging from a Congolese doctor who treats female victims of sexual violence, a nun who fought for indigenous rights before her murder in Brazil, and the assassinated Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto.

The UN Prize in the Field of Human Rights, awarded every five years, was presented at a General Assembly ceremony marking the 60th anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).

The winners are former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour; United States ex-Attorney-General Ramsey Clark; Executive Director and co-founder of Jamaicans for Justice Carolyn Gomes; Denis Mukwege, co-founder of the General Referral Hospital of Panzi in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC); Human Rights Watch, represented by its executive director Kenneth Roth; Ms. Bhutto; and Dorothy Stang of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur who was murdered in Brazil three years ago.

They join a distinguished roster of previous laureates that includes apartheid fighter and former South African President Nelson Mandela, US civil rights leader Martin Luther King, former US first Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, former US President Jimmy Carter, and Amnesty International.

The prize was first awarded on 10 December 1968 on the 20th anniversary of the adoption of the UDHR.

“As we mark the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, we acknowledge the tireless work and invaluable contribution of these individuals and organizations that have fought to see the rights and freedoms embodied in this historic document become a reality for people in all corners of the world,” Assembly President Miguel D’Escoto said.

“These awardees constitute symbols of persistence, valour and tenacity in their resistance to public and private authorities that violate human rights. They constitute a moral force to put an end to systematic human rights violations.” 

On Human Rights Day, UN rights chief reminisces, as victim and enforcer

On the day that the United Nations celebrated the 60th anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), the world body’s new top human rights official brought her own special focus to the issue – as victim and nemesis of abuse.

“I was told things like ‘white secretaries can’t take instructions from a black person,’” High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, who is of Indian descent, told the UN News Centre today, recalling her years growing up in apartheid South Africa when she wanted to become a lawyer in a society stratified by institutionalized racial discrimination.

But she persevered, completed her university law studies and, finally, was taken on as an intern by a black lawyer. She opened a law practice of her own in 1967, not out of choice, but because nobody would employ a black woman lawyer, and by the early 1970s, had challenged laws that permitted torture and unlawful methods of interrogation, leading to better conditions for all those imprisoned on Robben Island, including future president Nelson Mandela.

Over 20 years later, Ms. Pillay was on the other side of the bar, meting out justice to the Hutu extremist perpetrators of the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Tutsis and moderate Hutus as President of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).

“I came to know in painful detail, killing by killing, the unimaginable destruction of humanity when ethnic hatred exploded into genocide,” she said. “I know that the consequences of allowing discrimination, inequality and intolerance to fester and spiral out of control can have genocidal consequences.”

And how does the world appear today after a century marked by so much blood-letting, torture and persecution?

“Impunity, armed conflict and authoritarian rule have not been defeated,” she said. “Regrettably, human rights are at times sidestepped to promote short-sighted security agendas. And lamentably, a trade-off between justice and peace is often erroneously invoked when societies emerge from conflict and combatants return to their communities.

“It also distresses me that violence against women is still a daily occurrence in too many countries. The UN Security Council and international tribunals have clearly established that rape and other forms of sexual violence can amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity or may be regarded as constitutive acts with respect to genocide. Perpetrators should be brought to justice if cycles of violence and brutal retribution are to be halted.”

But just as she persevered over 40 years ago as a young university student, so will she persevere today as the world’s top human rights official. “One of the main challenges I face, like my predecessors, is to get the international community to take human rights seriously. When I leave this job, I would like to be able to say that I've made a real difference in some people’s lives, because the organization I head has functioned to its full potential.”

Ban leads chorus of UN voices calling for action to protect human rights of vulnerable

The international community has not lived up to the vision held in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today told a ceremony marking the 60th anniversary of the landmark document.

Drafted amid the “utter destruction and destitution following the Holocaust and World War II,” the Declaration is at the core of the United Nations’ identity, as “it reflects humanity’s aspirations for prosperity, dignity and peaceful coexistence,” Mr. Ban said in a video message.

The Declaration, which was adopted by the General Assembly 60 years ago on this day in 1948, states that everyone has the right to life, liberty and security and that all – regardless of race, gender, colour, sex, language, religion or political opinion – are equal before the law.

“Since I took office as Secretary-General, I have been very humbled and saddened by having seen so many people whose human rights are being abused and not properly protected,” the Secretary-General told attendees at a ceremony marking the day in New York.

“We see human trafficking, the exploitation of children, and a host of other ills plaguing millions of people,” he said, adding that despite “all the lessons we profess to have learned, shocking acts of brutality against innocent people often go unanswered.”

Mr. Ban also paid tribute to the individuals who risk their lives defending the rights of others around the world, including human rights experts, lawyers and journalists, as well as “ordinary people who find extraordinary courage and stand up for what is rightfully theirs, yours, mine and ours.”

Challenges threatening human rights around the world include the global financial crisis, the food emergency and “humankind’s assault on the natural environment,” he said in a separate message celebrating Human Rights Day, adding, that “there is political repression in too many countries, and, as ever, the most vulnerable continue to be on the frontlines of hardship and abuse.”

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, in her own statement commemorating the milestone, underscored the importance of the Declaration in shaping the principles laid down in the constitutions and laws of more than 90 countries.

She highlighted a range of specific provisions made in the Declaration, from the right not to be tortured, enslaved or arbitrarily detained, to the freedom of opinion, expression and religion, and the right to education, health and equal pay for equal work.

“For many people, the Universal Declaration remains an unfulfilled promise, as States’ political will to fulfil their obligations lags lamentably behind their pledges.”

The High Commissioner’s Representative in Nepal, Richard Bennett, echoed Ms. Pillay’s remarks at an event celebrating the Day in Kathmandu, adding that the Asian country’s progress towards peace faces its own formidable challenges, not least with problems related to discrimination.

Nepal faces many challenges, ranging from the extortion of money from businessmen by armed groups in the Terai to assuring employment for Dalit children, he said.

The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Nepal and its partners staged a number of activities commemorating the anniversary, including a photo exhibition highlighting prison conditions, launching a “Know Your Rights” campaign and a human rights marathon.

UN independent human rights experts marked the Day with a call to all States to intensify their efforts to realize the Declaration’s promise of dignity, justice and equality for all and to act together to guarantee human rights in today’s challenging times.

They stressed that the interests of individual States are inter-connected, emphasising that “new challenges include ensuring global access to food, and those presented by climate change and financial crisis have potentially massive human rights and development implications. If we are to confront them effectively, we must do so collectively.”

Opening two panel discussions commemorating the Declaration’s anniversary, the President of the General Assembly, Miguel D’Escoto, stressed that education, health, employment, housing, culture, food and recreation for all human beings are the document’s “essence.”

Sounding the alarm about the crisis of the lack of political will, Human Rights Council President Martin Ihoeghian Uhomoibhi voiced regret at the current dismal picture of human rights.

“The problem of poverty is rampant and stands at the core of the denial of many basic human rights. Children are exploited, the elderly are neglected and women are still denied their fundamental rights,” he said in his message to the General Assembly.

Racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance all pose huge challenges to establishing the pledges of equality, justice and freedom made at the signing of the Declaration, according to Mr. Uhomoibhi

Appealing to all Somalis to put an immediate stop to human rights violations and abuses, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative to the Horn of Africa nation, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, portrayed the grim reality on the ground for millions of the country’s impoverished people.

He said that the media coverage of piracy off the Somali coast has overshadowed the dire situation in much of the country, where many live in extreme poverty while atrocities such as killings, torture, rape and indiscriminate attacks on civilians continue unabated.

While welcoming a recent agreement to set up a working group to address the problem of impunity, Mr. Ould-Abdallah stressed that “leaders of all parties and groups involved since 1991 must take responsibility and be held accountable. Punishing the perpetrators of human rights abuses and protecting the vulnerable in their communities are universal obligations.”

Events commemorating the Day are planned to take place at UN Headquarters today, among them a plenary session of the General Assembly to present this year’s recipients of the UN Prize in the Field of Human Rights with their awards, panel discussions on human rights and a screening of a selection of the Stories on Human Rights films.

World-renowned pianist and UN Messenger of Peace, Daniel Barenboim, will also be performing with members of the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra in the General Assembly on 15 December. The concert is meant to commemorate the 60th anniversary and wrap up a year-long UN system-wide campaign, with the theme “Dignity and Justice for All of Us,” aimed at raising awareness of the Declaration.

The UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) honoured Stéphane Hessel, who helped draft the Declaration, with its prize for the Promotion of a Culture of Human Rights, at a presentation in Bilbao, Spain.

Mr. Hessel – one of the few survivors from the day of the adoption – was chief of staff for Deputy Secretary-General Henri Laugier at the time, and feels that the Declaration has aged somewhat.

“It is a monument to a certain era,” he told the UN News Centre, adding that “It didn't broach a number of problems like humankind's relationship with the environment and terrorism.” 

Human rights still not a reality for all, top UN official says

The promises enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) remain unfilled for tens of millions of people worldwide, the top United Nations human rights official said today, on the eve of the landmark document’s 60th anniversary.

After World War II, many were determined to ensure that there would never be another Holocaust and that everyone – especially the poor, hungry, displaced and marginalized – would have institutions and laws to protect them, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay told reporters in New York.

The Declaration states that everyone has the right to life, liberty and security and that all – regardless of race, gender, colour, sex, language, religion or political opinion – are equal before the law.

“Despite all our efforts over the past 60 years, this anniversary will pass many people by,” the High Commissioner said.

“Tens of millions of people around the world are still unaware that they have rights that they can demand, and that their governments are accountable to them, and to a wide-ranging body of rights-based national and international law,” she added.

Ms. Pillay also stressed that the global financial crisis could compound the dire situation faced by the poorest and most marginalized people around the world, adding that poverty is both the cause and a result of human rights violations.

“We will need to be extremely vigilant over the coming months to ensure that development programmes and social safety nets are maintained or enhanced, so the effects of the crisis do not become calamitous,” she said.

Despite the growing influence of the Internet enabling journalists, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and other civil society groups to expose human rights abuses, “no country in the world can sit back complacently and say, ‘We’re there,’” said the High Commissioner.

Welcoming the designation of 2009 as the International Year of Human Rights Learning, she encouraged governments, teachers, parents and “others in a position of responsibility all across the planet to take this opportunity to ensure that the next generation is given the maximum opportunity to claim what was promised to them in that extraordinary document known as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.”

In related news, a special UN advisor to the General Assembly President on water issues said today that the right to water must either be added to the UDHR or else be enshrined in a separate covenant.

Waterborne diseases are the leading cause of death for children, and “in every single case, if their parents could afford clean water, they would not have to die,” said Maude Barlow.

Characterizing the situation as “the most powerful and important face of inequity in our world,” she underscored the need to protect the world’s finite water sources as a human right.

“With declining fresh water sources and the demand growing so quickly, we’re now at a situation in the world where who owns and controls water is going to be very powerful,” the advisor cautioned.