UNESCO DIRECTOR-GENERAL HIGHLIGHTS IMPORTANCE OF EDUCATION IN LEARNING THE LESSONS OF THE HOLOCAUST
Paris, January 26 {No.2000-5} - UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura delivered a
video message to the Stockholm International Forum on the Holocaust which
opened this afternoon in the capital of Sweden. Recalling UNESCO's role in
science, education, culture and communication, "the bulwarks of human
rights", he highlighted the importance of education in learning the lessons
of the Holocaust so as to prevent the repetition of genocide and preserve
democracy.
Here is the full text of Mr Matsuura's message to the Forum:
"As Director-General of UNESCO, I am pleased to address a warm message of
greetings to all the distinguished participants in this International Forum,
dedicated to the advancement of Holocaust education, remembrance and
research.
"May I take this opportunity, to congratulate Prime Minister Persson and his
Government and the Governments of the United Kingdom, the United States,
Germany, Israel, Poland, the Netherlands and France on their courage and
determination in making Holocaust research and education a priority in their
own countries. The Task Force and the International Forum are outstanding
examples of the association of political will with the talents and insights
of the scholarly community to fight ignorance, intolerance and racism which
are the enemies of democratic societies and of peace.
"Indeed, this was the insight of UNESCO's founders immediately after the
war. They wrote, in the Preamble to our Organization's Constitution that:
"The great and terrible war which has now ended was a war made possible by
the denial of the democratic principles of the dignity, equality and mutual
respect of men, and the propagation, in their place, through ignorance and
prejudice, of the doctrine of the inequality of men and races". Our
founders, including Léon Blum, understood that education, science, culture
and communication are the bulwarks of human rights, democracy and security
among nations.
"UNESCO, with its half century of commitment to tolerance and human rights,
stands ready to work with you on this crucial issue. Over the years,
UNESCO's Member States have adopted crucial normative instruments such as
the Declaration Concerning the Right to Education, and the landmark 1978
Declaration on Race and Racial Prejudice. This year we are celebrating the
International Year for the Culture for Peace, proclaimed by the General
Assembly of the United Nations.
"The Holocaust - the Shoah - is a defining event of the century we are
leaving behind. Its horrendously large number of victims - men, women and
children - must be remembered, not only by historians, but by all of us, and
especially our young people. The Holocaust may have been the apogee of
state-sponsored genocide in our time, but campaigns of genocide and ethnic
cleansing have erupted in our contemporary world: Rwanda, Bosnia and
Herzegovina, Kosovo and East Timor are warnings for the future. Their
lessons, together with the lessons of the Holocaust, must be learned very
carefully and taught very well if we are to prevent intolerance, prejudice
and fanaticism from threatening our security in the future.
"As we have seen in the case of Holocaust and recent examples of ethnic
cleansing, genocide is only possible when freedom of expression and human
rights are trampled on and other cultures are presented as threatening or
inferior. Working at national and regional levels, the Organization has
helped its Member States to revise history and geography texts and to
improve teaching methods in these crucial fields. Support for free and
pluralistic media is the priority of UNESCO's communication programme. And
nothing symbolizes the cultural richness and pluralism of our world more, in
the Organization's work, than the World Heritage Programme. As you know, the
site of Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland has been inscribed on the World
Heritage List for many years.
"As Director-General of UNESCO, I give you my personal assurance that UNESCO
will work with you to achieve our shared goal of educating the children of
the new century in a spirit of tolerance and mutual respect."
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