Tag Archive for ‘human rights’
I am Haiti too!
Six months of meticulous research, planning, preparation, coordination, partnerships and team building led to an exceptionally well-organized and fruitful conference under the able hands of the Jean Robert Cadet Restavec Foundation and The Maurice Sixto Foundation.
Will Internationalism be the new US Mantra?
The United States will no longer shun the United Nations Human Rights Council. The Obama Administration announced today that it will seek a seat on the Council. More importantly, according to the Washington Post, New Zealand has offered to step aside in order to ensure that should the US bid for a seat on the [...]
Harry Belafonte, Most Charming Revolutionary
Over the last twenty years, I occasionally shared the limelight with Harry Belafonte, in the early 1990s in particular, as the campaigns on behalf of Haitian refugees denied asylum in the United States and democracy in Haiti joined to tilt the Clinton Administration’s hand towards democracy and human rights in Haiti. Belafonte spoke with the wisdom of a man who had seen his share of injustice and faced them with the conviction that comes from a place deep within.
From Protest to Politics: the Future of the Civil Rights Movement
Bayard Rustin is most closely identified as the master strategist behind the successful 1963 March on Washington. A consummate behind-the-scenes civil and human rights campaigner, Mr. Rustin labored in the trenches, took part in marches, sit-ins and demonstrations and initially guided Rev. Martin Luther King’s first steps as the civil rights and political leader that he was to become.
VISA says: Alleluia, Amen, Black is Beautiful. Yikes!
Just as the United States was readying itself to celebrate the Rev. Martin Luther King’s birthday and Barack Hussein Obama’s ascendance to the Presidency, VISA, the credit card company jumped on the bandwagon without missing a beat. With a full-page ad in Sunday’s NY Times Magazine, it introduced the “exclusive VISA Black Card.”
Martin Luther King: First Among Equals
Since that faithful day in 1955 when he stepped forward to speak on behalf of the clergy and lead the bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, Martin Luther King never ceased to inspire the struggle for civil and human rights in the United States and the rest of the world. He made many speeches in the 13 years that followed his arrival on the political scene, the most famous and remembered being “I have a dream,” the speech he made in August 1963 in Washington before what was then the largest crowd that had assembled to advocate for civil rights and equality for all
United Nations days: do they make a difference?
The learned leaders of the United Nations have not done us a great favor with their habit of designating commemorative dates that, although meaningful, tend to highlight the weakness of the world body rather than its strength and potential.
Haiti: The Phantom State Strikes Again
The Haitian state has consistently failed to provide basic minimum standards of safety, including access to food, clean water, safe roads and buildings, along with adequate schooling and health care. One of my Haitian friends says that Haiti is not a failed state, rather it is a “phantom state.” Yet this phantom is fatal.
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