Human rights Book

Since the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, a great number of international treaties and declarations have seen the light. Their implementation is deficient, however. Many states, especially in Asia, pay lip service to the universal validity of human rights, but see their supervision as a chiefly domestic affair. In some parts of the world there are regional supervision mechanisms to which citizens can turn when domestic remedies have been exhausted. Non-governmental organizations provide reliable information about violations of human rights. International criminal tribunals, on the former Yugoslavia and on Rwanda, and truth and reconciliation commissions are recently established institutions which aim to implement international humanitarianism and human rights law. As a political scientist, the author emphasizes the political features of human rights without ignoring their legal aspects.