Poverty and impunity undermine human rights in a divided world

The high level panel took place at the official Opening session of the world's largest human rights organization at its biennial International Council Meeting, attended by more than 400 representatives of Amnesty International from every region of the world.

The panellists included Jan Pronk, former Head of the UN Mission in Sudan; Ruth Ojiambo Ochieng, Executive Director of Isis-Women's International Cross Cultural Exchange (Isis-WICCE), Uganda; Hernando de Soto, President of the Lima-based ILD; Freshta Raper, an Iraqi Kurd from Halabja who was a victim of torture in her home country in the mid-1980s; Nader A Fergany, Director of Almishkat Centre for Research and Training in Cairo and lead author of The Arab Human Development Report; and, Irene Khan, Secretary General of Amnesty International.

The panel concluded that the three great hopes for closing these divides are a strengthened and reformed United Nations, the burgeoning of a global civil society, and the ability of today's youth to identify with a borderless world.

The official opening of the International Council Meeting was symbolized through the lighting of the Amnesty International Candle by two representatives from the Independent Human Rights Commission of Morelos (CIDHM), together with the Chair of the International Executive Committee of Amnesty International, Lilian Gonalves-Ho Kang You and the Chair of the International Council Meeting, Claus Hoxbro.

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