HETQ EDITOR PARTICIPATES IN DUBLIN HUMAN RIGHTS CONFERENCE

2010/0 2/12

World

Hetq Editor-in-Chief Edik Baghdasaryan is in Dublin, Ireland, to
participate in a three day conference of human rights activists
organized by the Dublin-based organization Front Line.

The biannual conference brings together activists and campaigners
working on issues ranging from the rights of women, indigenous people
and sexual minorities, to environmental protection and land rights.

Yesterday’s session heard testimony from human rights defenders
who have been threatened, harassed, jailed and tortured because of
their work.

The Front Line Dublin Platform, as the conference is dubbed, issued
a report noting that, "Despite the high level of commitment given to
the protection of human rights defenders in theory, the sad reality
is that the effective space for human rights defenders to work is
steadily shrinking."

Launching the report yesterday, Margaret Sekkagya, the UN special
rapporteur on human rights defenders, said that "those who fight every
day for the full respect of human rights continue to be oppressed".