Human rights for all
The preamble to the UN Declaration of Human Rights includes a powerful warning for wayward dictatorships: “Whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law.”
No UN member state may justify any violation of the final article of the declaration, which states that no “state, group or person [has] 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 [in the declaration].”
All true countries — whether they are recognized by the rest of the world or not — that seek an alliance of nations for the greatest good must uphold the “Universal Declaration of Human Rights as 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.”
Any governments that believe or preach otherwise, or that connive with specious arguments to convene and cultivate a cabal of barbarians — such as the South-South “Human Rights” Forum — and whose sole aim it is to undermine even one article of the declaration, those nations are themselves in serious error of understanding.
The rights of human beings, because they are human beings, supersede diversity, culture and even malevolent contrarians.
Correct yourselves, and remember, the original Commission on Human Rights consisted of 18 members from various political, cultural and religious backgrounds. These intellects included vice chairman of the committee, Chinese diplomat Chang Pengchung (張彭春).
“Dr Chang was a pluralist and held forth in charming fashion on the proposition that there is more than one kind of ultimate reality... Dr Chang suggested that the secretariat might well spend a few months studying the fundamentals of Confucianism,” commission chairwoman Eleanor Roosevelt said.
So, any government spokesman or dictator who suggests that the Declaration of Human Rights forces a Western perspective on the world’s diversity of cultures, mind history’s peacemakers, such as the esteemed Chang, a Chinese with indomitable human characteristics.
Xue Meng-ren
Taichung
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