High Commissioner Volker Türk Video message on Human Rights Day 2024

Today, as we mark Human Rights Day, I want to focus on what our rights mean. 

Human rights are about people. 

They are about you and your life: your needs and wants and fears; your hopes for the present and the future.

A safe home. Food and clean water. Health care. Education. Decent work and a liveable minimum wage. To live in peace. To be free to express your opinion. 

These are your human rights. 

They are about who we are, and how we live. 

They are the legal commitments all States have made to serve their people.

They are not abstract ideas or ideologies, up for debate at an elite club. 

Human rights are for the single mother with three jobs, putting her children through school. 

They are for the child crying for help, buried under the rubble of his home. 

They are for the poet, imprisoned for a verse that criticized the authorities. 

For the pensioner with a disability in wartime, trapped in her apartment for months without end. 

They are for communities living on land poisoned by chemicals.   

They are for young people who can’t afford a home; and for workers left behind by globalization. 

They give a voice – and opportunities – to the excluded and forgotten.

They are for each and every one of you who feels vulnerable, angry, confused, afraid, disenfranchised, and is seeking better.

Human rights don’t belong to any political party, or to any region of the world. 

They belong to all of us – to every one of you. 

Today, there are those who are trying to discredit and discard human rights – throwing glitter in our eyes as they redefine and undermine our fundamental freedoms.  

This is the politics of distraction. 

And I understand why. Human rights are simple, powerful ideas that motivate people to stand up for themselves – so they pose a  threat to autocrats, populists and authoritarians of all kinds. 

Previous generations fought and even died for human rights. 

The right to vote. The right to protest. The right to work, and to equal pay for women. The right to be seen, heard, and counted. 

Our forebears took to the streets, to parliaments and to the courts to fight against colonialism and apartheid, discrimination, inequality, slavery and racism. 

They built the international human rights system, bringing real improvements to the lives of people around the world.

Our humanity is robust. 

When faced with the greatest obstacles, people transcend their differences and overcome.   

Today, at another precarious moment for our world, many of you are doing the same – on climate action, on women’s rights, and on peace.

The full promise of human rights is still to be fulfilled. The evidence is everywhere. 

So, I urge you to stay the course. Mobilize. Use your voices and votes. 

Reach out and connect, to build strong social movements that stand up for your rights and those of future generations. 

Call on your leaders to work for equality, justice, peace – and all your human rights. 

On Human Rights Day and every day, I stand with you – to uphold the human rights of everyone, everywhere.