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The Philippines Embraces Youth for Human Rights International's Human Rights Education Campaign

As they near the completion of their 2006 World Tour, Youth for Human Rights International travelled to the Philippines where they met with educators and civil and community leaders who embraced the goal of the group — to make human rights a global reality.

Human rights is a vital issue in the Philippines where millions of people live in urban slums lacking sanitation and water, many fall victim to sexual trafficking and poverty all too often forces children into the job market.

In their first visit to this country, Youth for Human Rights International presented their human rights education program to members of the Department of Justice, the Secretary General of UNESCO Philippines, the National Commission on the Role of Filipino Women and Childhope Asia. They also demonstrated their human rights curriculum with a class presented at a local school and educated the general public on the program through TV coverage.

Youth for Human Rights International is an independent non-profit corporation headquartered in Los Angeles. It was founded in 2001 in coordination with the Human Rights Department of the Church of Scientology International.

YHRI’s purpose is to educate young people in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights so they become valuable advocates for tolerance and peace.

Their visit to the Philippines is part of their 3rd annual World Tour. With a human rights education program, created in partnership with the Church of Scientology International, they are carrying out the 1948 mandate of the United Nations, for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which called for all Member countries "to cause it to be disseminated, displayed, read and expounded principally in schools and other educational institutions, without distinction based on the political status of countries or territories."

Art and Activism Caravan

The Art and Activism Caravan is a border crossing project, that started early June, travelling for 3 months from Greece via Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia Herzegovina and Hungary to the eco-activist gathering Ecotopia in Slovakia. Its aim is to support and connect youth, campaign, community and activist groups, their actions and campaigns with creative forms of activism. The participants share skills in the field of video, creative writing, music and dance, sculpturing, street performance, drawing and painting, samba and screen printing.

In Athens the Caravan worked with students at the occupied Politecnik University. Bitola, Macedonia saw a week of events organised by the local youth forum and ended in a large event with music and films at the local amphitheatre. In Tirana, Albania the workshops worked on an action at the Ministery of Internal Affairs for clean drinking water and in the small community of Plav, Montenegro a big parade at the end of the week got most of the village onto the streets. In Belgrade a memorial vigil for the victims of the Srebrenica genocide was held the day the Caravan arrived and some workshops supported a local campaign to save a small park from being build on. In Novi Sad the week was about campaigning for a cultural youth centre as well as for opening up Serbian borders. After much interest in the Indymedia project, some people from the Caravan who also work for UK Indymedia have been discussing the setting up of a Serbia Indymedia. The work of the Caravan consists of working on creative forms of activism. Whether this is making banners, costumes, large puppets or clowning about, playing samba, making short videos, printing t-shirts or making mosaics. It's acknowledging that activism can easily be made more creative and become more accessible and fun.

See AA Caravan Indymedia for full coverage

Feature articles on the AA Caravan Indymedia page:

Groups involved in the AA Caravan are EYFA (European Youth For Action), The Mischief Makers (creative activist collective, Nottingham), Rhythms of Resistance (samba), Undercurrents (UK video collective), Rebel Clown Army and VideA (video collective, Turkey).