Netherlands Embassy holds ‘Human Rights Movie Day’

To celebrate International Human Rights Day, the Netherlands Embassy in Ghana held a movie screening followed by a discussion.

The movie ‘Stories of our Lives’, a documentary of Artists’ collective The Nest from Nairobi depicting the dangers that lesbian, gay, bisexuals and transgender (LGBT) people face while they fight for their rights in modern-day Kenya.

This year the Human Rights Day’s theme was ‘Our Rights, Our Freedoms, Always’ At its core, Freedom, underpins the Universal Declaration of Human Rights –freedom from fear, freedom of speech, freedom of worship and freedom from want.

The Netherlands presses for international action on LGBT human rights. “We do this firstly, by actively contributing to international and regional organisations like the United Nations Human Rights Council or the Council of Europe.

Secondly, by supporting local human rights organizations such as the Human Rights Advocacy Centre in Ghana. And lastly, by including LGBT people in our sexual and reproductive health programmes.

It is important that LGBT people worldwide have access to sexual and reproductive health services and products and that they are protected from discrimination and stigmatization. Human rights are for all, regardless of who you are or whom you love.

Caecilia Wijgers, acting Ambassador of the Netherlands Embassy, speaking after the movie explained that the movie is to highlight the importance of human rights in every jurisdiction as it is part of Netherland’s foreign policy, “It is an integral part of our foreign policy and dialogues is the best way to go.”

She said: “We promote human rights anywhere in the world and the dialogue can be about for instance child protection, gender equality but also on respect for the human rights of LGBT people.”

The 10th of December commemorates the day on which, in 1948, the United

Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the related UN conventions apply to all people, in all places, without discrimination on any grounds.

As the Declaration states in Article 1, each human being is born free and equal in dignity and rights.