Today All Men Were Supposed To Be Equal -FREE Jestina Mukoko-
Today is World Human Rights Day. designated by the United Nations to serve this charter. this universal charter was the insurance policy of sorts that was intended to guarantee Equal Rights to All Mankind Globally.
-FREE Jestina Mukoko-
So What Has Happened to This Universal Declaration ?
SELECTED ARTICLESArticle 1: All human beings are born free and equalArticle 3: Everyone has the right to life, liberty and securityArticle 4: No-one shall be held in slavery or servitudeArticle 5: No-one shall be subjected to tortureArticle 9: No-one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrestArticle 18: Everyone has the right to freedom of thought
in our opinion, it’s been the lamb slaughtered repeatedly, for no reason. there seem to be large pockets of craziness that spring up when one set of interests ignores the needs of another who is not of “Their Camp”. Of Recent, this is the case with the UN and how it administers Justice in the World Court.
Killers, Genocidal Maniacs and Warlords were supposed to be swiftly dispatched for the good of mankind. so why is this not happening ?
that’s a good question – and I think we should all ask Mr Ban Ki Moon.
Too Much Suffering, Pain, Genocide, War and Terrorism combines into the non functional bloated body of self righteous zealots we have sitting in a marble bunker – absolutely oblivious to the conditions of the world.
So why do we bother to send anyone from anywhere to this body of insolence ?
Maybe it’s time we started demanding more, since we are after all – Mankind..
Really Doh,
Parts of Zimbabwe are in the grip of a deadly cholera outbreak
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Zimbabwe’s opposition MDC says an adviser to party leader Morgan Tsvangirai has been abducted in Harare.
Eyewitnesses say MDC adviser Gandhi Mudzingwa was forced by nine gunmen into a car which then drove to the city centre on Monday afternoon.
It would bring to 18 the number of MDC activists and rights campaigners who have vanished in the past six weeks.
Meanwhile, Zimbabwe’s president accused the West of plotting an invasion amid a deadly cholera outbreak.
The cholera has spread to Zimbabwe’s neighbours and South African Health Minister Barbara Hogan has said the epidemic will probably keep getting worse until a new government is formed in Harare.
President Robert Mugabe’s ruling Zanu-PF party and Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) have been deadlocked in power-sharing negotiations since September.
The UN says nearly 600 Zimbabweans are known to have died in the outbreak, but there are fears that the number may be much higher.
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 The West is seeking to use the window of opportunity provided by the disaster to justify military intervention  Sikhanyiso Ndlovu
Zimbabwe information minister  |
On Tuesday, US President George W Bush joined calls from world leaders for President Mugabe to go.
“We urge others from the region to step up and join the growing chorus of voices calling for an end to Mugabe’s tyranny,” said Mr Bush, who leaves office himself next month.
African countries like Botswana and Kenya have also said Mr Mugabe should quit.
But the 53-member African Union said on Tuesday the only solution to the Zimbabwe crisis was the power-sharing talks.
“Only dialogue between the Zimbabwean parties, supported by the AU and other regional actors, can restore peace and stability to that country,” said Salva Rweyemamu, a spokesman for AU chairman and Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete, Reuters news agency reports.
Stranglehold
The MDC says it believes there is a systematic plot to decimate its structures, as well as civil rights groups involved in cataloguing violence and human rights abuses in Zimbabwe.
There are claims civil rights groups are being targeted in Zimbabwe
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The BBC’s Peter Biles in Johannesburg says there is also growing concern about the fate of Zimbabwe Peace Project director Jestina Mukoko, missing since she was kidnapped from her home last Wednesday.
An urgent court application is being filed, demanding police produce her if she is in custody.
MDC leader Mr Tsvangirai has not been back in the country since he left more than a month ago to attend a summit in Johannesburg – where efforts failed again to end the political impasse in Zimbabwe.
Zimbabwean presidential spokesman George Charamba told the state-owned Herald newspaper that Western countries were planning to bring Zimbabwe before the UN Security Council by claiming the cholera epidemic and food shortages had incapacitated the country’s government.
Later Zimbabwe Information Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu was quoted by AFP news agency as saying the cholera outbreak was under control, adding: “After squeezing and strangling the country with sanctions and contaminating it with cholera and anthrax, the West is seeking to use the window of opportunity provided by the disaster to justify military intervention.”
‘Critical’
Mrs Hogan said she believed the cholera situation in South Africa had been contained, although many more Zimbabweans should be expected in the country.
Morgan Tsvangirai agreed to share power with Zanu-PF in September
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“We need a government in Zimbabwe and we have to move forward on that issue,” she said as she led a team of health experts to assess the cholera outbreak in Limpopo province bordering Zimbabwe, where at least eight people have died from the disease and 650 people are being treated.
“It is critical – just from health alone,” she said.
The BBC’s Jonah Fisher in the border town of Musina says South Africa’s medical services are coping so far with the scores of sick Zimbabweans crossing the border every day looking for treatment.
But there is concern that people are sleeping in the open in conditions where the easily treatable disease could spread, while sanitation is poor at the site where new arrivals are being processed.
A South African man in Musina told the BBC: “They are sleeping here, they bath here, they do everything here, so I mean, the spreading of cholera, the risk is very high.”
Meanwhile, a Southern African Development Community team dispatched to Zimbabwe on Monday is continuing to look at the extent of the epidemic.
The UN children’s agency Unicef has warned 60,000 cholera cases could emerge in the coming weeks.
World marks UN Human Rights Day
(bbc news)
Nations around the world are marking the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The 30-point document was adopted by the UN in the aftermath of WWII and emphasises rights and freedoms that are held to apply to everyone in the world.
The Declaration has come to form the basis of much international law and has provided moral and legal backing for UN action against human rights violators.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said it was needed now as much as in 1948.
“The challenges we face today are as daunting as those that confronted the Declaration’s drafters,” Mr Ban said in a statement.
The world faces a “food emergency and global financial crisis” and “there is political repression in too many countries,” Mr Ban said.
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The Universal Declaration has inspired millions fighting for freedom and justice over the past six decades and continues to be a beacon of hope for people around the world. Mary Robinson
Former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights |
“As ever, the most vulnerable continue to be on the frontlines of hardship and abuse.”
He urged “those who are spared the most negative effects of disaster, poverty or instability” to not “turn a blind eye” to rights abuses.
“The cascading effects of abuse and indifference can eventually engulf the entire planet.”
‘Much to do’
On the eve of the 10 December anniversary, hundreds of Chinese lawyers, writers, academics and artists issued an online call for greater freedoms in China and democratic reforms, including an end to Communist one-party rule.
Two of the activists who signed the document, Zhang Zhuhua and Liu Xiaobo, were detained by police and questioned after the document – Charter 08 – was posted online, Reuters news agency said.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navanethem Pillay, welcomed US President-elect Barack Obama’s pledge to close the the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay, which houses hundreds of terrorism suspects detained since the 9/11 attacks.
The UN Human Rights Commissioner wants an enquiry into Guantanamo Bay
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She called for an inquiry into the facility, “so that conditions such as arbitrary detention, torture, cruel and inhuman treatment, are not ever again espoused by the US or copied by other countries”.
Former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, called the Declaration the “single most important global statement of the inherent dignity and equal rights of all people”.
It “has inspired millions fighting for freedom and justice over the past six decades and continues to be a beacon of hope for people around the world,” she told the BBC News website.
But she said much progress remained to be done towards fulfilling the ambitions set down in the Declaration.
She said that for women around the world, domestic violence remained a daily reality and that about one billion people “are daily denied basic rights to adequate food and clean water”.
Nearly 1 billion people are starving, UN food agency says
Almost 1 billion people in the world are going hungry each day after the rising food costs have pushed 40 million more people into chronic hunger this year, the UN food agency’s chief said Tuesday.
The goal of halving the number of hungry people by 2015 has suffered a “serious setback” as the food crisis has pushed more people, particularly in the developing world, toward hunger.
“For many countries, the world goal of reducing hunger by half is becoming increasingly difficult to achieve,” Food and Agriculture Organisation Director-General Jacques Diouf said, referring to one of the Millennium Development Goals set in 2000.
“This sad reality should not be acceptable at the dawn of the 21st century,” he said, unveiling the Rome-based agency’s annual report on world food insecurity . He added: “Even the objective of cutting by half the number of hungry by 2015 is morally unacceptable.”
An estimated 963 million people, or 14 per cent of the world’s population, are unable to afford to eat enough calories to lead a normal life, the report found – with 65 per cent of those living in seven countries: India, China, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Pakistan and Ethiopia.
The crisis affects mainly the poorest, the landless and female-headed households, says the report, “The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2008.”
Mr Diouf, who has called on wealthy countries to invest $30 billion (£20 billion) a year in agriculture, said the figure was only eight percent of agricultural subsidies paid out in developed countries.
“Thirty billion dollars is nothing compared to subsidies and support in OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) countries, … nothing compared to the billions of dollars being spent in all developing countries to face the (ongoing global) financial crisis,” he said.
“I don’t think that (30 billion dollars) is asking too much,” Mr Diouf said.
“We are not saying that (farmers in wealthy countries) should not be supported,” he said. “But they should be supported in a way that does not distort the market and have a negative impact on the capacity of farmers in developing countries.”
“We must ask, ‘What is the priority? Is it the 963 million who don’t have the basic human right to eat?’” Mr Diouf said.
Mr Diouf said he had asked US President-Elect Barack Obama to take the lead in the goal of “eradicating hunger from the face of the earth,” beginning with a summit next year “to find the ways and means for mobilising 30 billion dollars a year.”
Echoing Mr Obama’s campaign slogan “Yes We Can,” Mr Diouf said: “We can do it … if we give priority to world food security.
“We Are Not Making Adequate Progress”
Former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
On this International Human Rights Day, which marks the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, two women are on my mind.
One is a leader of the past who still inspires because of what she helped achieve so many years ago.
The other is a leader in her community today, who struggles against the odds for a more just society in the midst of ongoing crisis.
Eleanor Roosevelt remained a tireless campaigner throughout her life
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The first woman is Eleanor Roosevelt. Her leadership in 1948 as the chair of the UN Commission on Human Rights was critical in bringing the nations of the world together to create the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – the single most important global statement of the inherent dignity and equal rights of all people.
Eleanor famously said that human rights would mean nothing unless they matter “in small places, close to home.”
The Universal Declaration has inspired millions fighting for freedom and justice over the past six decades and continues to be a beacon of hope for people around the world.
The other woman on my mind is Jestina Mukoko. Jestina is director of the Zimbabwe Peace Project, a civil society organisation, working at the grassroots and community level on peace building. She is a contemporary human rights defender, trying to make Eleanor Roosevelt’s dream of human rights a reality in her nation.
The struggle continues
Jestina was abducted from her home in the early hours of Wednesday, 3 December, 2008 by a gang of plainclothes men armed with guns. They took her from her home in the outskirts of Harare in an unmarked car.
She has not been seen since. Friends, family and colleagues are still trying to ascertain her whereabouts.
Jestina was working for a more democratic government in Zimbabwe which would ensure respect for human rights for all its people.
Her story and so many others like it remind us that the struggle for human rights continues.
Jestina Mukoko has not been seen since being abducted (photo courtesy of Tonderai X)
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Over the past year, The Elders – a group inspired by the example of Nelson Mandela – have sought to reintroduce the Universal Declaration to millions of people around the world through the Every Human Has Rights campaign.
We wanted new generations to know that 60 years ago, nations were able to look beyond their moment – which was fearful and uncertain, much like ours – and shape a vision of a more just and equitable future for all.
We wanted to reinforce principles that are central to the Declaration, but too often forgotten in our day, that “every individual and every organ of society” has responsibilities for human rights as the Declaration puts it, and that we all have duties to our communities.
You can get involved and make your commitment to upholding the Universal Declaration at www.everyhumanhasrights.org.
There is still so much to do.
- • For women around the world, domestic violence and discrimination in employment are a daily reality;
• Minorities still suffer stigma, discrimination and violence in developed and developing countries;
• The right to information is denied to millions through censorship and media intimidation;
• At least one billion very poor people, 20% of humanity, are daily denied basic rights to adequate food and clean water.
While such violations of rights persist, we cannot claim to be making adequate progress towards fulfilling the ambitions set down in the Universal Declaration 60 years ago.
The best tribute we could make to Eleanor Roosevelt, and to human rights defenders of our day like Jestina Mukoko, is to summon the leadership, resources, and commitment needed to ensure that the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration are not only recognized universally, but implemented as well.
World marks UN Human Rights Day
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights has been called a Magna Carta for all humanity. Pope John Paul II described it as “one of the highest expressions of the human conscience of our time”.
Its adoption marked the first time in history that people from different cultures had worked together to identify a common vision of the specific rights and freedoms of all human beings.
How did the declaration come into being?
In 1945, following the horrors of World War II and the Holocaust, a number of governments said “never again”, and drew up the United Nations Charter. A commission “for the promotion of human rights”, chaired by the former US First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, was also established.
Differences in language and values made drafting the UDHR a marathon of meetings and negotiations. The world’s major legal systems and legal philosophies had to be considered and religions including Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Hindu, Islam and Judaism.
How long did it take?
The Commission was created in 1946. It completed its proposed declaration in June 1948. The final draft went to the full General Assembly on 6 December 1948. On 10 December, 48 states voted to adopt it. None voted against, eight abstained.
What is in the declaration?
It consists of a preamble and 30 articles, setting forth the human rights and fundamental freedoms to which all people, everywhere, are entitled.
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SELECTED ARTICLES
Article 1: All human beings are born free and equal
Article 3: Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security
Article 4: No-one shall be held in slavery or servitude
Article 5: No-one shall be subjected to torture
Article 9: No-one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest
Article 18: Everyone has the right to freedom of thought
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It identifies civil and political rights such as the right not to be subjected to torture, to equality before the law, to a fair trial, to freedom of movement, to asylum and to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, opinion and expression.
It also includes economic, social and cultural rights such as the right to food, clothing, housing and medical care, to social security, to work, to equal pay for equal work, to form trade unions and to education.
What has the declaration achieved?
Over the past 50 years the Universal Declaration has become a powerful tool in the armoury of those trying to dissuade governments from violating human rights. Many lawyers regard it as part of customary international law.
Along with the UN Charter, it has provided the moral and legal basis for United Nations action – including action by the Security Council – against violators of human rights.
Countries have included the language and principles of the UDHR in their national constitutions, and in their statutory laws and regulations. The Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental freedoms adopted by the Council of Europe in 1950, and Article II of the Charter of the Organisation of African Unity are two examples of documents which draw heavily on the UDHR.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights: 1948-2008
(united nations)
“On this Human Rights Day, it is my hope that we will all act on our collective responsibility to uphold the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration. We can only honour the towering vision of that inspiring document when its principles are fully applied everywhere, for everyone.”
Video
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
“We must work for the full implementation of human rights on the ground in a way that affects and improves the lives of the men, women and children who are all entitled, regardless of their race, sex, religion, nationality, property or birth, to realization of each and every right set forth in the Universal Declaration.”
High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navanethem Pillay
Schedule of Events for Human Rights Day 10 December, 2008
at UN Headquarters in New York
On Human Rights Day, 10 December, 2007 the Secretary-General launched a year-long campaign during which all parts of the United Nations family took part in the lead up to the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) on Human Rights Day 2008.
With more than 360 language versions to help them, UN organizations around the globe used the year to focus on helping people everywhere to learn about their human rights. The UDHR was the first international recognition that all human beings have fundamental rights and freedoms and it continues to be a living and relevant document today.
The theme of the campaign, “Dignity and justice for all of us,” reinforces the vision of the Declaration as a commitment to universal dignity and justice and not something that should be viewed as a luxury or a wish-list.
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By Paul Reynolds
World affairs correspondent BBC News website |
The UN Human Rights Declaration has stood up remarkably well to the test of the 60 years since it was agreed in Paris on 10 December 1948.
Its main strength lies in its simplicity.
In a preamble and 30 articles, none of them very long, it lists the rights to which each individual is entitled. It is also wide-ranging, emphasising rights to education and health as well as to freedom and protection.
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SELECTED ARTICLES
Article 1: All human beings are born free and equal
Article 3: Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security
Article 4: No-one shall be held in slavery or servitude
Article 5: No-one shall be subjected to torture
Article 9: No-one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest
Article 18: Everyone has the right to freedom of thought
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It has echoes of and in some cases directly lifts from earlier human rights documents. By picking and choosing from these, it is trying to show that it applies to all people and all places.A key principle behind the Declaration was to confirm a move in world affairs from the concept of human rights as a domestic concern to an international one.
The aftermath of World War II and the Holocaust was felt to be the right moment to act. Shortly before the Declaration was agreed, the UN Charter had been drawn up. Activists wanted to fill in some of the detail of the human rights to be protected. The Charter only refers to “respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms”.
Echoes
From the US Declaration of Independence in 1776, the Declaration stresses the right to “life (and) liberty”, though the American addition of the right to the “pursuit of happiness” becomes the more sombre “liberty and security of the person”. Perhaps happiness as a concept was not felt to be appropriate at that moment.
Largely matching the French Declaration on the Rights of Man in 1789, which said: “Men are born and remain free and equal in rights”, it states: “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.”
And the prohibition on “cruel or unusual punishment” in the Bill of Rights in England in 1689 becomes the even wider ban on “cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment or treatment” in the Declaration.
Its other strength is that it is a declaration not a treaty. That meant it was easier to agree. In the final vote, nobody was against, but the Soviet Union and its allies, and South Africa and Saudi Arabia abstained. They could be outvoted for a declaration, not for a treaty.
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Saudi Arabia said the Declaration was based largely on Western culture, an argument that has resonance in some Islamic countries today |
The Soviet Union objected to individual property rights being included and more broadly wanted rights to be determined according to the “economic, social and national conditions prevailing in each country”. Its delegate declared that the rights were “illusory” because they “lacked effective guarantees”.South Africa did not accept that “human dignity would be impaired if a person were told he could not reside in a particular area.” Saudi Arabia said the Declaration was based largely on Western culture, an argument that has resonance in some Islamic countries today.
Eleanor Roosevelt, the first chair of the Human Rights Commission which drew it up, was responsible for the form of the agreement. She felt it would be better to have a signpost to guide the UN itself and governments in the progressive application of human rights in international agreements and national laws. And it has helped to do just that.
Torture Convention
Although it is not itself enforceable, it has given rise to other agreements which are. A good example is torture. The ban on torture enshrined in its Article 5 was made into an international convention against torture in 1975. The Convention acknowledges its debt.
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It is magnificent and inspirational Amnesty International’s Campaign Director Tim Hancock
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The Declaration was also followed, in Europe, by the even more detailed European Convention on Human Rights, which drew on its principles and took them even further. The Convention is now part of national law in many Council of Europe states and it has own court to adjudicate claims.The Declaration has itself also weakened the UN Charter’s emphasis on national sovereignty and strengthened the recent moves establishing a right to protection for threatened populations.
Of course, great chunks of the Declaration have been ignored and violated by large parts of the world. Its declaratory nature can be a source of weakness as well. But it is always there to hold governments to some account. Increasingly it has provided the kind of inspiration that its founders had envisaged.
Cataloguing violations
Amnesty International’s Campaign Director Tim Hancock says he refers to the Declaration constantly. “Recently, I found it useful in cataloguing the atrocious violations in the Congo,” he said.
“The Declaration is a fine document which serves as the bedrock for later treaties. It is magnificent and inspirational. The Torture Convention for example is based on it and Amnesty would like to get back to the inspiration of the original document in trying to stop the widespread flouting of the convention, including certain conduct in the war on terror.
“We find young people respond to the accessible language and 4,000 British schools have taken our information pack for the anniversary.
“This anniversary has reminded me that the preamble is sometimes neglected. It warns about what happens if human rights themselves are neglected. ‘Barbarous acts’ follow and man is ‘compelled to have recourse, in the last resort, to rebellion.’”
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Tags: freedom, genocide, human rights, united nations, universal declaration of human rights
