Africa
MR Volker Türk, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, on Monday said he viewed the 2023 global human rights event as a call to hope and action.
He stated this at a hybrid high-level event to commemorate the 75th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Human Rights Day, observed yearly on Dec. 10, commemorates the day the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).
The theme for the 2023 commemoration is, “Freedom, Equality and Justice for all.”
Türk said the drafters of the Universal Declaration transcended geo-political clashes and economic differences, and set aside many terrible disputes to achieve the luminous text.
This text, he said, lit the path to peace, justice and freedom.
According to him, at a time of so little solidarity, and so much divisive and short-sighted vision, the 75th anniversary is a call to overcome polarisation, and work with courage and principles, together, to resolve the huge challenges the world faces.
The human rights chief noted that alongside the progress that had transformed many societies, there had also been numerous failures to uphold human rights over the past 75 years.
He said the world lived among such failures today with the turmoil and suffering that they produced.
Some of these failures, he said include war, famine, oppressive and hateful discrimination, threats to human rights generated by climate change, pollution and biodiversity loss.
Türk said that they were profound and interlocking challenges that stemmed from the failure to uphold human rights.
He further said the guide to a solution to the challenges existed.
“This global event encapsulates a year of passionate and probing conversations across the world about the Universal Declaration and it seeks to project that energy forward, as we face our challenging future.
“It is a call to hark back to the spirit that led every Member State to adopt the Universal Declaration, and to base local, national and global decisions, across all areas of policy, on the intrinsic and equal value of every human life,” he said. (NAN)
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December 12, 2023 @ 6:47 GMT|
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