Revisiting The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)

Following the Second World War, which saw terrible atrocities, world leaders led by Eleanor Rooseveldt, met together to frame a statement of the fundamental rights of all human beings, all equal under the law, with the aim of ensuring that never again would the vulnerable be subjected to the horrors and degradations inflicted upon them between 1939-1946.  Sor further information see here

48 countries signed UDHR, including the UK and USA, many then ratified further human rights treaties into domestic law.  Eight countries did not sign including Saudi Arabia and South Africa.

To remind ourselves, I pick out some key articles from UDHR which are the unalienable and fundamental human rights of all human beings:

Article 2 - everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person

Article 3 - no one shall be subjected to torture, cruel and degrading treatment and punishment

Article 9 - no one shall be subject to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile

Article 12 - no one shall be subject to arbitrary interference in their privacy, family, home or correspondence nor to attacks upon their honour or reputation.  They have the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks

Article 13 - everyone has the right to freedom of movement, the right to leave their own country and another country and to return

Article 18 - everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion (and religious worship)

Article 19 - everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; the right to freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers

Article 20 - everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association

Article 25 - everyone has a right to a standard of living adequate for health and wellbeing of self and family to food, clothes, medical care etc and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, age etc

Article 27 - everyone has the right to freely participate in the cultural life of their community and enjoy the arts.

UDHR had moral influence but no legal force until it was enshrined during the 1970s in The International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights

Governments should not suspend or arbitarily override, for pointless, exaggerated, unnecessary (or purely vindictive) purposes any, most or all these fundamental human rights.