Global Campus of Human Rights Magazine n 8 (December 2022)

Abstract

This year’s EMA Graduation and Inauguration Ceremony in the Scuola Grande di San Rocco on 25 September was dedicated to commemorate the 25!" anniversary of the European Master in Human Rights and Democratisation (EMA). In his keynote speech and interview with this Magazine, one of the founders of EMA, Paul Lemmens, reminded us how Antonio Papisca, the “idealist from the University of Padua”, and Daniela Napoli, the “activist from the European Commission’s unit for Human Rights and Democratisation”, had laid the foundation for this innovative transdisciplinary, pan-European and inter-university Master programme. A#er Antonio had invited his colleagues from other EU based universities to a first meeting in the Palazzo Ducale in the spring of 1997, Massimo Cacciari, then Mayor of Venice, offered to host this programme in Venice. While the first generation of EMA Masterini 1997/98 was taught at a former secondary school on Giudecca, the second generation was already hosted at our Monastery of San Nicolo at the Lido. I vividly remember the day in late spring 1998 when Antonio proudly showed us our new venue and none of us could imagine that the necessary renovation work could be achieved during the few months until the students were in fact taught in the Aula Magna (now named Antonio Papisca Hall) and lodged in the former monks’ cells. Sadly, Daniela Napoli was no longer able to celebrate 25 years of EMA with us as she had passed away shortly before. With sincere gratitude and admiration for all her activist human rights work, I presented the Global Campus Medal of Honour for Daniela to her husband during this year’s Ceremony, which was also overshadowed by the sudden and tragic death of our longtime and beloved IT and web advertising coordinator, Nicola Tonon. Since its inauguration in 1997, more than 2000 EMA Masterini have graduated in Venice and work as human rights professionals, activists and defenders in governments, inter-governmental and non-governmental organisations, the corporate sector and academia, where they spread the message of human rights as our EMAlumni and EMAmbassadors to all corners of our planet. Jessica Fiorelli, EMA graduate of 2016 and newly elected President of the EMAlumni Association, shares in her interview her belief in the power of the EMA and Global Campus Alumni community to make positive change in our societies. In times of growing economic inequality, climate disaster, disinformation and a brutal war in Europe, such positive visions of young change makers are most encouraging. Next year, we will commemorate 75 years of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and 30 years of the Vienna World Conference on Human Rights. It is indeed high time for a radical change in our current world order of insecurity and destabilisation. The Global Campus of Human Rights with its seven regional Master programmes as the world’s largest university network of post graduate human rights education is prepared to actively contribute to this urgently needed change towards a new world order based on peace, global justice, democracy, the rule of law, sustainable development and universal human rights, including rights of future generations and rights of nature. In addition to providing human rights education and trainings, including of more than 500 electoral observers (see the interview with Ambra Longatti of the European External Action Service), the Global Campus is increasingly engaged in supporting grassroots human rights defenders, based upon the social responsibility of universities and our global academic human rights community. Thanks to our long-term partnership with Right Livelihood, we are closely cooperating with Right Livelihood Laureates. Vladimir Slivyak, co-founder of Ecodefense, one of the oldest environmental groups in Russia and Right Livelihood Laureate of 2021, in his keynote speech at the EMA Graduation Ceremony, explained his campaigns to stop various nuclear and fossil fuel projects in an increasingly authoritarian environment in the Russian Federation: “In order to protect our environment, which is essential for human survival, you need democracy and the respect for human rights. So both things – human rights and environmental protection – are very well interconnected.” On 6 November, during a workshop at the office of Right Livelihood in Geneva, we finalized and signed the contract for our new joint five years’ project on providing support to human rights experts and defenders in exile; and on 30 November, we represented the Global Campus during the 2022 Right Livelihood Award Presentation in Stockholm to the new Laureates from Somalia, the Ukraine, Venezuela and Uganda, whose achievements are described in detail in this Magazine. Since the takeover of power by the Taliban in Afghanistan in August 2021, the Global Campus is directly involved in providing a safe space for threatened Afghan students, scholars and human rights defenders at our universities. In another interview with this Magazine, Aurora Prize 2022 Laureate Jamila Afghani explains the difficulties of helping Afghan women, youth and children in refugee camps and underlines the importance of human rights education: “The only way to change the course of our country is through educating our future leaders. …Only through education we are able to shi# the mindset of future generations to secure a more peaceful and inclusive society.” In this context, the Global Campus expressed its outrage about the deliberate attack on the Haj Education Centre in Kabul on 30 September 2022, when more than 50 students were killed and more than 100 injured. Other highlights of Global Campus activities during recent months described in this Magazine were the Summer School on Cinema, Human Rights and Advocacy, organized on an annual basis in cooperation with the Venice International Film Festival; the organization of a human rights course for more than 1000 Timorese Students by our Human Rights Centre of the National University of Timor Leste, which will be officially handed over to the University in December in the context of celebrating 20 years of independence of Timor Leste in the presence of President Jose Ramos Horta; the MOOC on Science and Human Rights as an introduction for our International Conference on this topic to be held in Buenos Aires from 27 February to 3 March 2023; a Training on Academic Freedom which we provided to the Human Rights Focal Points of EU Delegations worldwide in Brussels on 15 November; the EU NGO Forum “Stop Impunity – The Road to Accountability and Justice” in Brussels on 14-15 December; the Global Forum on Justice for Children and Deprivation of Liberty in Nouakchott, Mauritania, on 8-9 November, where we took stock of recent developments in the implementation of the recommendations of the UN Global Study on Children Deprived of Liberty, which I had presented to the UN General Assembly in October 2019. The 8!" Global Campus of Human Rights Magazine once more illustrates the broad variety of impressive activities carried out by the Global Campus in times of dramatic European and global crises and challenges as well as shrinking financial resources. _______________________________________________________________________ This issue includes interviews and special contributions: Prof. Paul Lemmens, Former Judge at the European Court of Human Rights; Jessica Fiorelli, President of of the EMAlumni Association; Jamila Afghani, 2022 Aurora Prize; Vladimir Slivyak, 2021 Right Livelihood Laureate; Ambra Longatti, EEAS Policy Officer