Uniting For Human Rights



Posted: Wednesday, December 24, 2008

by

Groups and individuals around the world United for Human Rights to celebrate the 60 th Anniversary of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), which was adopted in answer to the atrocities of WWII by the UN General Assembly on December 10, 1948.

The Youth for Human Rights Chapter of Vancouver with the support of the Church of Scientology of B.C. joined in on the festivities with groups including the United Nations Association, the B.C. Coalition for Human Rights, and Amnesty International who were all recognizing December 10 th , 2008 as a special day.

Although the UDHR was ratified by the UN General Assembly representing all member nations 60 years ago and it is the most broadly adopted human rights document on Earth human rights violations still abound even today as per recent research revealing that:

"Adopting the UDHR is one thing but actually getting every country to implement and enforce it is another," said Mary Shuttleworth, President for Youth for Human Rights International (YHRI). "When YHRI was first formed we found that a vast majority of people had never heard of the UDHR we are changing that now with our educational campaigns and joining with other human rights groups to do so."

YHRI was launched in 2001 with the purpose of education young people about human rights, specifically the UDHR, so they become advocates for tolerance and peace. It has since expanded to 178 groups and chapters in 87 countries. YHRI distributes educational booklets and short films depicting each of the 30 of the articles of the UDHR. The films have aired in over 72 countries on more than 3,500 TV stations.

Local spokesperson Susan Kerr said, "Raising awareness of the UDHR and its importance in today's world is critical. By joining forces in our own neighborhoods and cities we can expand the respect for human rights around the world."

Copies of the YHRI resource materials may be gotten from the website humanrights.com or contact in Vancouver yhri-van@hotmail.com .

For more information contact:

Youth for Human Rights BC Chapter

Susan Kerr

yhri-van@hotmail.com

604-681-9121

This Article has been viewed 31 times. (Not updated in real-time.)
No comments yet.
We want your comments! If you can read this, you don't have javascript enabled, so you can't use this comment system. Please enable javascript.