Member states of the Organisation of American States, OAS, have been asked to take a broader view on the issue of Human Rights.
The call came from Minister of Economic Planning, Camillo Gonsalves as he addressed the plenary of the 47th General Assembly of the OAS, held last week in Cancún, Mexico.
He said his nation SVG had noticed a concerted attempt to use the pursuit of human rights within the hemisphere in a manner that seems destined to produce nakedly political outcomes, whether by design or as the unintended consequence of well-meaning activism.
Minister Gonsalves also noted that the more prosperous the advocate, the more narrowly it defines human rights and the sub-groups that merit its attention.
“The definition of Human Rights is necessarily broader for peoples for whom the right to education, the right to housing, the right to decent work, the right to health, the right to safety, and the right not be rendered stateless are still urgent and immediate issues”.
Gonsalves said he hopes the OAS would confront human rights: not as a box to check, or matter to be faced in isolated and selective silos, but as a crosscutting and multifaceted ideal, rooted in development.