In advancing Amnesty International’s mission to promote and defend human rights and to foster a society that values human dignity, equality and justice, human rights education plays a crucial role. To strengthen this very mission, Amnesty International Nepal regularly provides training to its members with an aim to empowering them to act as an educator to impart the fundamentals of human rights to the people at the community level including reaching out to young people at schools and colleges.
As part of this initiative, a two-day training cum workshop was organised for 58 participants in Bhaktapur from April 5-6.
Welcoming all the participants to the workshop, Hom Bahadur Adhikari, Deputy General Secretary of the National Board, said, “This capacity-building training program is crucial to create awareness and effectively promote and defend human rights in Nepal to strengthen the AI movement in Nepal. We hope that all those who are participating learn from each other so we can go on to make a difference in the community.”
Following his brief welcome note, AI Nepal Human Rights Education Coordinator Kundan Raj Sharma welcomed all the participants with a brief introduction, a quick introduction of the training program, and acknowledgement of the contributions by Amnesty Nepal Group and Youth Networks that reached the most people through their Human Rights Education (HRE) sessions in 2023.
The workshop included two presentations — one by AI Nepal Director Nirajan Thapaliya on the topic ‘Introduction to the Basics of Human Rights’, and the other by AI Nepal Human Rights Education Coordinator Kundan Raj Sharma on ‘The Idea of Human Rights & Human Rights Education”.
AI Nepal Director Nirajan Thapaliya’s presentation touched on the fundamental principles of human rights, the world’s geopolitical history leading up to the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, economic social and cultural rights, different human rights treaties, and international frameworks, among others.
AI Nepal Human Rights Education Coordinator Kundan Raj Sharma’s session further elaborated on Thapaliya’s session on the fundamentals of human rights and the importance of human rights, the role of the government in protecting the rights of its people, the role human rights defenders play in defending human rights, among others.
The workshop also included a number of participatory group sessions, such as a mock human rights education class for students based on Amnesty International’s Human Rights Handbook and a session on the busting of myths surrounding various human rights issues such as LGBTQIA+ rights, the right to safe abortion, forced eviction of informal settlers, torture and custodial deaths, among others.
The group sessions were facilitated by Amnesty Nepal’s Human Rights Education Coordinator Kundan Raj Sharma and Campaigns Coordinator Ashmita Sapkota. They also touched on the ongoing campaigns of the organization and the position of the global Amnesty movement on different human rights issues that were discussed.
Sapkota also conducted a session on Amnesty International’s global flagship campaign ‘Abolish the Death Penalty’, which stressed on why Amnesty strictly opposes the death penalty no matter what the nature of the crime. The workshop also included a session that centered on the logistics of carrying out HRE sessions.
Addressing the closing of the workshop, Amnesty Nepal Chairperson Bipin Budhathoki said, “In a nation that is becoming increasingly restrictive towards the general public and embracing impunity for those in power, it is absolutely imperative that we, as a part of the global Amnesty movement, realise the role we play in holding the government accountable, to commit to our drive to strengthen the human rights movement, and to carry forward the spirit of activism in Nepal.”
His note also touched on other issues Amnesty Nepal advocates for, such as the rights of the migrant workers, transitional justice, right to protest, death penalty, among others.
The workshop also included the screening of a Pakistani film ‘Dukhtar’, which is a story of a mother fleeing her home with her 10-year-old daughter to protect her from being married off to an old man.
