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Remarks on the Human Rights Agenda for the 21st Century
By: K.Boyko
January 14, 2010
Remarks on the Human Rights Agenda for the 21st Century.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, at Georgetown University, December 14, 2009
This week we observe Human Rights Week. At the State Department, though, every week is Human Rights Week. Sixty-one years ago this month, the worlds leaders proclaimed a new framework of rights, laws, and institutions that could fulfill the vow of never again.They affirmed the universality of human rights through the Universal Declaration and legal agreements including those aimed at combating genocide, war crimes and torture, and challenging discrimination against women and racial and religious minorities. Burgeoning civil society movements and nongovernmental organizations became essential partners in advancing the principle that every person counts, and in exposing those who violate that standard.
As we celebrate that progress, though, our focus must be on the work that remains to be done. The preamble of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights encourages us to use it as a, quote, standard of achievement. And so we should. But we cannot deny the gap that remains between its eloquent promises and the life experiences of so many of our fellow human beings. Now, we must finish the job.
http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2009a/12/133544.htm
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