Introduction: Defend Human Rights Defenders

[The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is] a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction.
Introductory paragraph of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Human rights become a viable part of human lives because of human rights defenders. The work of these defenders extends far beyond their own communities and often beyond national borders. It reaches into shanty towns and refugee camps and into the highest government offices and meeting rooms of international decision-makers.

Because human rights defenders compile information about rights abuses, lend support to survivors, and demand government accountability for official actions or inaction, many of them risk life-threatening retaliation. Throughout the world, human rights defenders suffer arrest, imprisonment, and torture. Both governments and armed opposition forces, fearing revelations of their human rights abuses, are responsible for murders of human rights defenders.

Wealthy landowners in Brazil and factions on both sides of conflicts in Liberia and Rwanda also have singled out human rights workers for violent attack. Rights defenders endure robberies in the Dominican Republic, telephone taps in Zambia, and police surveillance in Greece. Death threats against them, and sometimes against their children or other family members, are common. Still, they persevere.

Many government authorities attempt to silence individuals who speak out for human rights by entangling them in legal proceedings. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, authorities closed down the country's leading human rights office on spurious charges of legal infractions. Colombian army officers have charged numerous human rights activists with "slander." Although Colombian courts rarely prosecute the cases, the charges deflect attention and resources from human rights work. Malaysian authorities brought charges of "false reporting" against a human rights organizer who documented the severe abuses in her country. Police arrested her in March 1996, and trial proceedings are expected to continue throughout 1998.

Imprisonment is both a threat and a reality in many countries. Human rights defenders are now serving 10-year jail sentences in Syria. Chinese authorities sentenced Wang Dan in 1996 to 11 years' imprisonment. His "crime" was publishing articles abroad on human rights abuses in China. Kalpana Chakma, an indigenous rights activist in Bangladesh, had no trial. Army officers abducted her in mid-1996, and she has not been seen again since then.

These human rights defenders, like many others worldwide, paid a high price for monitoring, defending, and promoting human rights. They took seriously a universal responsibility to claim human rights personally and to act on that claim. Several jailed activists, once released from prison, went on to become their country's president: Vaclav Havel in the Czech Republic, Kim Dae Jung in South Korea, and Nelson Mandela in South Africa.

All human rights protection begins with the fundamental right to know what human rights are. From there, an individual learns to recognize human rights abuses and, for human rights defenders, develops strategies for halting present abuses and preventing future abuses. Human rights education, providing local communities with information about claiming rights and about defending them, is one strategy.

Related efforts to defend human rights include publicizing rights abuses by governments or other authorities, organizing legal or other assistance for victims of abuse, and mobilizing to institute changes in government policies and practices. When a person unjustly jailed is released from prison, a person who has "disappeared" reappears, or a survivor receives reparations for rights abuses, the personal victory is accompanied by success in human rights defense.

Despite the risks they face, local human rights organizations are now growing in almost all African countries. Throughout the Americas, human rights activists continue to build constituencies. Although many Asian countries bar all human rights organizing, individual activists manage to monitor developments and communicate with colleagues abroad.

Almost all European countries have local human rights groups, some of them highly effective and others still struggling to establish themselves amid government harassment and assaults. Only about half of the countries in the Middle East today allow local human rights monitoring, but Middle Eastern activists have contributed to important human rights advances in recent years.

Where human rights defenders are at work, the foundations of peace and justice are growing stronger.

Act Now:

Request and Read
Study a survey of human rights abuses and defenders around the world, or read Nelson Mandela’s account of the struggle against apartheid in South Africa.

Act Locally
Ask your city or state Human Rights Commission to honor one or more human rights defenders as a way of encouraging others to support human rights work.

Act Nationally or Internationally
Encourage prompt adoption of the United Nations Human Rights Defenders Declaration by circulating this petition and asking friends and colleagues to sign.

Grab a Partner
Monitor the struggles and victories of human rights defenders and learn about activist human rights organizations through the Human Rights Internet.

Raise Your Voice
Help Dr. Beko Ransome-Kuti regain his freedom after being jailed on charges of accessory to treason while defending democracy and human rights in Nigeria.