Topic: Protecting the Human Right to Peaceful Protest
Country: Netherlands
Delegate Name: Ella Tretter
School: Vicksburg High School
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All Netherlands position papers GLIMUN 2013 committees
Peaceful protesting is people coming together to voice their opinion about a topic without using violence or weapons. All the UN members passed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights law in 1948. According to United Nations website, Articles 19 and 20 ensure that “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression.” The Netherlands embodied these ideas and are consistently compelled by our parliamentary government.
The Netherlands recognizes many countries make evident the importance of freedom of speech and have it represented in their governing laws, however, more often than not, many of these countries have often turned to violence during a protest prematurely for fear of losing control or disagreeing with the protesters ideals. The acts of violence used by the government and military or police personal directly violates the rights of peaceful protesters when administering punishment that is not deserved. The controversial point lies within what defines “illegal or violent” protesting. This is a gray area that needs to be defined to protect the rights of a country’s citizens. The second part to defining the problem is what actions the United Nation’s members should take on countries that violate these articles.
The Netherlands also realize that many countries do not want to give their people the right to publicly display their opinions. The United Nations respects a countries right to remain a sovereign nation, the delegation of the Netherlands would like to remind our fellow delegates that in 1948 the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was passed and the United Nations needs to represent what we promised our people.
