December 10 - Human Rights Day

 

                    ''ALL HUMAN BEINGS ARE BORN FREE AND EQUAL IN DIGNITY AND RIGHTS''

                     Human Rights Day is observed every year on 10 December - the day on which the United Nations General Assembly adopted , in 1948,the universal Declaration of Human Rights. The universal Declaration of Human Rights is a milestone document that publicly announces the absolute rights which all the human beings are entitled to irrespective of any race, colour, religion, sex, language, political or other opinions , national or social origin , property, birth or other status. 

             This year's Human Right Day theme is ''Recover Better - Stand up for Human Rights''. It is linked  to the COVID - 19 pandemic with the focus on the need of building a back better by ensuring human rights are the center of the recovery efforts. 

            An early achievement of the United Nations was to consolidate documents like the French Declaration of the Rights of men (1789) and the American Bill of Rights (1791) into a single international charter. There was a need for a declaration after World War -II ,and the UN charter did not define individual rights. 

               The declaration was the brainchild of the director of the human rights division  in the United Nations secretariat , John peters Humphrey and Eleanor Roosevelt ,UN human rights commission chair. The thirty articles set out rights such as equality before the law, liberty ,education, and freedom of conscience. It was written as a set of objectives and principles for individual governments to follow and has provide a form of moral pressure that can be brought to bear on a bear on a deviant government.  The declaration was adopted with no votes against. Six soviet bloc countries, Saudi Arabia and South Africa abstained. It was adopted as international law in 1976. The declaration is sometimes criticized as being insufficiently flexible to allow for cultural variation. Nevertheless, as a milestone on the global acceptance of the rights of individuals against oppressive regimes, it has proved a vital and positive achievement. It has also led to the wider development of human rights law.

             In South Africa , Human Rights Day is celebrated on 21 March, In remembrance of the Sharpeville massacre which took place on 21 March 1960. This massacre occurred as a result of protest against the Apartheid regime in South Africa. It is celebrated on 11 December in Kiribati.