| CATALOGUE OF
DEMANDS OF AUSTRIAN HUMAN RIGHTS NGOS
Aside from and parallel to the granting of awards, the Foundation
has also developed other activities in the area of Austrian
and international human rights policy and education in human
rights. Together with like-minded human rights groups and
organisations in Austria the Foundation has taken part in
building an Austrian human rights network and in formulating
the „Catalogue of demands
from Austrian non-governmental Organisations for the structural
establishment of human rights in Austria“ 1998.
This was subsequently presented to the Austrian government
and Chancellor Viktor Klima.
In an intensive interchange between Austrian human rights
groups and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary
Robinson, the human rights policy of the Republic of
Austria was subject to critical discussion and the demands
in the catalogue were presented. Central demands from the
catalogue put forward by Austrian human rights NGOs, such
as the creation of a human rights committee in parliament,
have meanwhile been realised.
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Authors of the catalogue of demands of Austrian human
rights NGOs briefing
UN High Commissioner for Human
Rights Mary Robinson. |
UN High Commissioner for Human or
Rights Mary Robinson meeting with
representatives of Austrian human rights NGOs. |
Presentation of the catalogue of demands of Austrian
human rights NGOs to Federal
Chancellor Viktor Klima 1998.
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NETWORKING & EDUCATION
Networking of Austrian human rights NGOs in 1997 and 1998
brought results. The Kreisky Foundation for Human Rights in
cooperation with the Austrian Study Centre for Peace and Conflict
Resolution Stadtschlaining (ASPR), with financial support
from the chancellery and the ministry of foreign affairs,
developed the project „Capacity
Building“. In the course of this project, between
1999 and 2002, more than 30 experts from Austrian human rights
NGOs have been trained in international election observation
missions and in conflict mediation, at ASPR. The graduates
of the Capacity Building project are central to the pool of
Austrian experts for international missions.
A pilot project on trans-national human rights education
was also undertaken in 1997 together with schools from Vienna,
Hungary and Slovakia. In the course of seminars over a number
of days, students from the three participating countries met
together with human rights experts from various fields in
Vienna.
Since 1997, the Foundation is a member of the Euro-Mediterranean
Human Rights Network, EMHRN, www.emhrn.net, a network of more
than 80 human rights organisations from the European Union
and the signatory states to the Barcelona Declaration (Turkey,
Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Palestinian autonomous territories,
Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Libya as observer).
In cooperation with the Kreisky Foundation for Human Rights,
in 2000 a working group Palestine, Israel and Palestinians
www.emhrn.net/pages/55 of the EMHRN was founded in Athens.
Since 2003 four conferences of the working group have been
held in Austria, under the chairmanship of the Kreisky Foundation
as primus inter pares. The main aim of the working group is
to coordinate the activities of members from the occupied
Palestinian areas, Israel and Europe and to support human
rights in both societies and in the conflict zone. The working
group has published an annual
monitoring report since 2003/4 on the human rights
aspects of relations between the EU and Israel.
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Students from Budapest, Trnova and
Viennaat a cross boarder seminar on
human rights 1997
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Participants of the cross boarder seminar
in the former living room of Bruno Kreisky.
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Members of the Working Group on Palestine,
Israel and Palestinians on their way to
a meeting in Austria, 2004.
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A Human Rights Review of the EU and Israel 2003-04
Relating Commitments to Action
(by Susan Rockwell/Charles Shamas, 2004)
http://www.emhrn.net/pages/75
A Human Rights Review of the EU and Israel 2004-2005
Mainstreaming or Selectively Extinguishing Human Rights?
(by Susan Rockwell/Charles Shamas, 2006)
http://www.emhrn.net/pages/77
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