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Archives and Human Rights: recent conferences
Three major conferences were held in November on archives and human rights.
The Department of Culture of the Government of Andalusia, Spain, in cooperation with the University of Malaga and the International Council on Archives, presented an international seminar in Malaga, Spain, on “Legacy, Conflicts and Human Rights.” The papers will be published in January in the electronic magazine ARCH-E, and a summary of the conference appears on the website of the International Council on Archives.
A second conference, “Secret Police Archives: A Challenge for the Democratic Transition?” was held in Tunis, Tunisia, by the non-governmental organization Le Labo’ Democratique, supported by the Geneva, Switzerland, Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces. See the program and a report on the conference.
In Columbia the The Archivo General de la Nación held a seminar on “Archivos y Derechos Humanos: Organización, Protección y Acceso.” See the conference programme here.
The Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, the Swiss Federal Archives and the non-governmental organization Swisspeace initiated a joint venture project, “Archives and Dealing with the Past.” Representatives of Swisspeace presented the project to members of the Human Rights Working Group during the seminar in Malaga, Spain. The aim of the project is “to provide a support to governments, international organizations and NGOs related to the protection of archives which document human rights violations.” The project will undertake “an assessment to identify specific needs with local actors” and support them in “designing and implementing tailor made responses” with the help of “a broad network of experts” who, if requested, will “offer training, analysis and counseling.” The project “also supports local actors to find some funding for these purposes.” For further information, contact Swisspeace at Archives and Dealing with the Past Project, Sonnenbergstrasse 17, CH-3000 Bern 7, Switzerland, tel +41 (0)31 330 10 78, .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), http://www.swisspeace.ch/dwp.
Source: International Council on Archives Human Rights Working Group Newsletter November 2011.
Comments
These are noble developments but i feel they are not publiced enough to most of us especially in Southern Africa in particular Zimbabwe…I feel it can be more effective if communicated with governmental line ministries which run national archival institutions.
I myself am a qualified archivists by training and so need to be assiciated witrh your institution but I do no have the links or knowledge of the procedures.I am a holder of a BSc Hons Degree in Records and Archives Management frm the National University of Science and Technology in Zimbabwe.