8 December 2018
Armanshahr Foundation is holding the 6th Human Rights Week from 8-14 December, as in the past six years, marking the National Day of Victims in Afghanistan (9 December), the International Human Rights Day (10 December) and the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, by organising several educational, socio-political and cultural programmes. These programmes include: a three-day educational workshop on “Sexual Violence and Crimes in War and Post-War periods”, two public conferences on women’s issues and sexual violence and a report on the Geneva Conference, the closing ceremony of the “5th International Simorgh Peace Prize and My Ideal City Campaign”, a photo exhibition of the selected drawings and writings of children submitted to the 5th International Simorgh Peace Prize, film screening in the framework of “40 Braids Film Caravan” and distribution of more than 3,000 copies of new books published by Armanshahr.
Rooholamin Amini, deputy director of Armanshahr Foundation, opened the 6th Human Rights Week with the following words:
Human beings are not 70 years old, neither 7,000 years old. Human beings have lived thousands and thousands of years on this small planet together with demons and angels; they have loved the clouds, the wind, the fog, the sun and the heavens and they have cursed them. They have endeared other human beings and have failed to do so.
Human beings are not 70 years old, but 70 years ago, having gone through centuries, having passed by Genghis Khan and arrived at Hitler, they signed their instrument of dignity and reminded themselves: “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.” And in its conclusion, they reproached themselves: “Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.”
70 years ago, they stated in between those two articles that nobody may be deprived of their human rights based on cultural, sexual, racial, political and other differences; that every human being has the rights to freedom and security, justice, choice of land, property, freedom to choose a spouse, freedom of expression and opinion, fair employment, self-defence, rest and recreation, health, welfare and education.
Human beings are not 70 years old, but over 70 years ago they massacred more than 70 million of their fellow human beings, and war and ignorance are still clutching at our throats.
That catastrophe was called World War II and the present catastrophe is World War III, and that is the one in which this land and several other countries in the world are burning. Half the world is caught in such wars and we are still told that it is not a world war.
70 years ago, World War II forced human beings to bring their conscience on paper and to pen the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. 70 years later, we have gathered here to celebrate the 30 articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, to celebrate human beings during the Simorgh Festival of children.
Can you find any human being who may not strive for the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights? There are, however many human beings in this world and in this land, who do not wish others to enjoy the rights enshrined in that Declaration and that is the beginning of every war.
One year ago, children from Kandahar to Herat to Kabul heard Armanshahr’s call and sent us 2,000 texts and drawings in praise of peace. They pictured peace beautifully and precisely and they identified the hatred of war. If I were the decision maker, Bibi Halima, Umulbanin, Mahdia or any of these girls and boys would become the president of the High Council of Peace. To be honest, they have more beautiful dreams than any of us.
Every one of these children had written and drawn a universal declaration of human rights for me and you, while 70 years later the world of the adults is still writing violence with blood on the walls of cities and villages.
As the human Ahmad Shamlu said: these children are tree branches that are screaming towards the light in the darkness of the forest.
