70 years of Universal Declaration on Human Rights

Today we celebrate Human Rights Day 2018.

70 years ago since the Universal Declaration on Human Rights was proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly, and ever since states basic rights and fundamental freedoms to which all human beings are entitled.

ECOM together with its partners celebrates International Human Rights Day and declares its commitment to ensure that all gay men, other MSM and trans people in EECA region can fully enjoy their human rights and freedoms. With that, we work to reduce the level of stigma and discriminations towards gay men, other MSM and trans people, primarily among health care providers. ECOM also puts efforts that HIV-service organizations serving MSM and trans people acknowledge the value of human rights in HIV prevention.

One of the ECOM’s Strategic objectives for the period 2017-2021 is to Contribute to formation of legal and social environment conducive of the right to health, and we work that legislative barriers for official registration of community organizations are removed, and also that anti-discrimination legislation has been adopted in the countries of the EECA region, prohibiting sexual orientation and gender identity based discrimination.

Eleanor Roosevelt, the Chair of UN Commission on Human Rights in 1948 said: “Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home - so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person; the neighborhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the factory, farm, or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerted citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world.”