Hi everybody!
Here is the newsletter of the Human Rights WG and, though some of you think
that it may seem too long and maybe a little boring, we invite you all to
read it. ;-)
All those who are interested in joining the WG are welcome and can contact
our Secretary: Natalie the Mighty (address is at the bottom)!
Best wishes for your Summer holidays. :-)
HUMAN RIGHTS WORKING GROUP UPDATE (25/06/1999)
*SPRING AGORA 1999, Barcelona
At the Agora we have organized a money-collection for Kosovar refugees.
People who donated money received a red sticker in order to encourage
others (without stickers) to participate as well.
The amount of money that we raised was 50.000 pesetas, which resembles
about 300 Euros. Thanks again to the people who contributed. We have
donated the money to a special account of UNHCR in Spain, only meant for
Kosovo-donations. There was an exhibition of Homeless-newspapers from
countries like Germany, Spain, Italy, Hungary, Holland. There were not
enough participants for the Homeless Photo-Contest to make an exhibition,
maybe we will try again at a later stage.
The signatures for our petition against death penalty were handed in at the
Agora. The total amount of signatures raised is 2000. Thanks everyone
(special thanks to the Skopje-HRWG and AEGEE-Valencia) for raising so many
signatures!!!
Özgür Özdamar presented a workshop about the Kurdish question and human
rights issues connected to that topic. Besides that there has been a
wg-meeting, where we discussed about the projects and had input from the
participants. A new topic that came up was the discrimination/ exclusion of
‘outsiders’ like handicapped people, in their own society.
* CONTINUOUS ACTION
- Death penalty:
The signatures that were handed in at the Agora will be presented to the
Hands off Cain organization, which will present them to the United Nations.
Besides that there will be a conference about the death penalty in Lviv.
The Human Rights Working Group is assisting in finding speakers and
fundraising.
Contact: Alex Zucconi
-Peace and Human Rights in the Balkans:
The HRWG is very much concerned with the tremendous sufferings due to the
Kosovo-war. Our former actions were connected to the Independent Student
Union of Pristina, the Student Unions in Serbia and the Kosovar refugees.
This meant mainly workshops, a letter of concern, money-collection. We are
supporting the Bridges to Kosovo-project. This project focuses on real
commitment in the area of Kosovo and concrete action, like giving help in
rebuilding, organizing meetings between Serbs and Albanians and organizing
a final conference with experts in Budapest. People from the
Heidelberg-HRWG are involved in preparations for a Mediation-weekend with
Kosovar and Serbian students in Wuerzburg/Germany, which is organized by
AIESEC/AEGEE Heidelberg (from 18.6-20.6). Furthermore, people from the HRWG
will assist in efforts to get places and scholarships for Serbian and
Albanian students in foreign Universities. Contacts: Roland
Jesseit, Else Weijsenfeld
- Homelessness:
The homeless people all over Europe are socially excluded and encounter
huge problems in daily life. Besides the past activities on this topic
there will be a European Homeless Action Day in November. We invite all
locals to participate!
This project might be broadened, to include also other ‘outsiders’ within
our
own society, such as disabled people. Besides specific problems there are
common hurdles for both groups, like for instance discrimination and social
exclusion.
Contact: Berber Hettinga
- Human Rights and the Students Movement in South East Asia (Indonesia and
Burma):
The Heidelberg-HRWG is mostly concerned with this project. South-East Asia
has relevance for AEGEE-Europe because of multiple reasons. First of all
ther is a historical connection through countries which had colonies in
South-East Asia.
Burma especially has a close connection to Europe, because companies from
our countries in Europe are supporting the autocratic, military regime and
are violating human rights of students in Burma. The Heidelberg-HRWG is in
contact with the Free Burma Coalition, a grouping of various organisations
involved in campaigning for the respect of Human Rights and Democracy in
Burma. Furthermore they established contact with the Watch Indonesia Bureau
and Nobel Peace Prize winner Jose Ramos Horta, who assured being willing to
attend an AEGEE-meeting as a speaker. On the 27th of may 1999 four
Burmesian students gave a lecture in
Heidelberg. One of them is right now with the resistance at the border to
Thailand, the other three are living in Germnay, in exile. Their main
campaign
now is to isolate Burma, to throw them out of the U.N. Also they are
campaigning against companies still working with Burma regime, financing
them through mainly oil and gas. They succeeded in the case of Pepsi Cola
in the US. The lecture was attended mostly by students from ethnological
and politological sciences. Afterwards there was a lively and large
discussion.
Contact: Roland Jesseit
* WE NEED YOU !!!!
For all our projects we need people in different cities, preferably (but
not
necessarily) in teams to work, find interested people, coordinate, discuss
etc.
+ For instance, for the Sout-East-Asia project we need to establish a team
which is interested in work on the concept for a congress, concept for
pratical work: e.g. book collecting, sponsoring in kind for resistance
groups like computers, modems etc., PR-work, economical relations
Europe-South Asia (especially Netherlands,Germany and Portugal and South
East Asia), political relationships: friendships and enemities (e.g.
Habibie and Germany).
+For the European Homeless Action Day we need people to organize this in
their city. Furthermore this new idea of including other ‘outsiders’ needs
to be
elaborated and discussed.
+For the Peace and Human Rights in the Balkans-project we need people who
want to discuss about the Human Rights-aspects of the war and
peace-building in Serbia, people to work on the actions locally, like
pressuring politicians, working on the university-project or whatever new
comes up.
+Furthermore we invite you to introduce the writing-nights (in cooperation
with
Amnesty International) in your local.
Just contact the person who is concerned with the project you are
interested in and join the action!!!!!!!
Thanks to all those who endured reading till here! .. and now you can know
who we are!
* THE BOARD:
- President:
Else Weijsenfeld
I.B.Bakkerlaan 139
NL- 3582 XV Utrecht
Tel: +31.30.2511753
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
[log in to unmask]
Secretary:
Natalie Van der Linden
Eerste Helmersstr. 184-I
NL- 1054 EL Amsterdam Netherlands
Tel: +31-20.6162133
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
- Treasurer: -External relations:
Ozgür Ozdamar David Chillaron
mm-120 C/La Palla 13-17, 4’ 2A
Odtü 06530 Ankara 08002 Barcelona
Turkey Espańa
Tel: +90-312.2101131 Tel: **34-670-233232
E-mail: [log in to unmask] E-mail: [log in to unmask]
Death Penalty Project/
PR responsible
Alex Zucconi
Via del Boschetto, 144
00184 Roma
Italia
E-mail:[log in to unmask]
Project Responsible South-East Asia/
IT-Responsible:
Roland Jesseit
Goethestr. 7
D-69221 Dossenheim Germany
Tel: +49-6221-861206
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
-Project Responsible Homeless &
Landmines:
Berber Hettinga
Justus van Effenstr. 15 bis
3511 HJ Utrecht
Netherlands
Tel: +31-30-2322904
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
Ciao Ciao
Alex Zucconi
Human Rights PR responsible
AEGEE-Roma
[log in to unmask]
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