Zagreb, October 30, 2007

The Human Rights Center started to implement its role as the Institutional partner for the East - East: Partnership Beyond Borders Program in Croatia for the first time in the year 2007 (more precisely in the period from February 1, 2007 to January 31, 2008).

We consider our present membership in the East-East Program as very useful for the Human Rights Center, also for Croatian civil society organizations regarding to the possibilities it offers for exchanges of experience, knowledge and ideas within the East - East region and beyond.
This was accomplished in a daily communication among the East-East coordinators on the one hand; while on the other hand; through the implementation of the HRC's first project "SEE Pipeline NGO Network".

Up to now, the Human Rights Center came up with one comprehensive project entitled "SEE Pipeline NGO Network", which has been implemented from September 1, and will be carried out till the end of January 2008. Additionally, we plan to forward a second pilot project that would be related to the issue of EU and human rights.

Our vision for the year 2008 will largely continue to follow the vision from t2007, because of a few basic reasons. First of all, we strongly believe that when applicable, the long-term approach in a form of follow-up activities should be implemented in order to achieve the full potential offered through the cooperation and more results within the particular project. Also, it is worthwhile to further support the particular cooperation if it is fruitful, innovative and contributes to the improvement of specific human right(s) either on a national, regional or international level.

Therefore, we suggest the following themes for the vision in 2008.

1) EU and Human Rights

The European system of human rights protection becomes more and more important in the context of Croatia's Accession to the European Union. Therefore the cooperation among new EU member states, candidate, potential candidate countries and the EU eastern neighbors remains in our focus.
The HRC started to continuously monitor this political relationship in 2007, through its' initial research about the influence of EU accession on human rights in Croatia, conducted by its Information and Research Department. This research opened up a series of discussion on various human rights themes in Croatia, which were not analyzed from that view before.
Three sub themes emerged as those, which warrant our special attention in the upcoming period: anti discrimination, free legal assistance, as well as the general gap between the legislation and implementation in practice. Furthermore, there will be other human rights issues that will be negotiated within the Chapter 23, Justice and Fundamental Rights.
However, it should be always kept in mind that even though Croatian EU accession opens up a new window of opportunity for advocacy of higher human rights standards and practice in Croatia, these standards could and often should be higher than the EU standards.

2) Education in/for Human Rights and Civic Education

An education in/for human right is the continued strategic priority of the Center, due to the fact that no significant improvements happened in Croatia in this field in the recent period.
Croatian civil society organizations have great experience and knowledge in in-formal education about anti discrimination, human rights, non-violence and other related themes. On the other hand there is no systematic and obligatory anti-bias education about human rights, tolerance and diversity integrated within the cycles of the Croatian official educational system: primary, secondary and high education. Civic Education is also not incorporated into the mainstream curricula. We foreseen two perspectives within this theme:

• a) Analyzing the level of integration of Education in/for human rights within the Educational System

• b) Human rights libraries
  

3) The Right to a Healthy Environment and Sustainable Development

These rights belong to the third generation of human rights, known as collective rights, which means that they belong to societies and peoples, thus surpassing national, political and ethnic boundaries.
Looking from that perspective, this is the right theme, which should be dealt through networking and joint cooperation regardless of state borders. Natural resources of water, oil, gas, etc. are main focuses of interest of powerful business and political centers. Uncontrolled exploitation of nature is directly related to the right to a health, since environmental damage has direct impact on health and people's life finally.
There is an enormous need for educating people to take an active role in their communities, which goes from raising environmental awareness to concrete actions aiming to preserve healthy and sustainable environments and biodiversity.
The HRC will continue to further support and nurture the established SEE Pipeline Network, which in this stage encompasses ecological NGOs from 14 countries. Now, when the network is established and the Sisak Declaration brought, joint follow-up activities should continue to take place. Pipeline projects will start with its implementation, and the Network should be well prepared for achieving its' goals. The concrete follow-up activity foreseen in the year 2008 is the organization of a mayor international inter-sector conference.

4) Human Rights and people with disabilities

People with disabilities remain one of the mostly marginalized groups within most societies. However, significant improvements have been made on the international legislative level, through the adoption of the Convention on the rights of people with disabilities in August 2006. Due to the facts that the Convention is intended as a human rights instrument with an explicit, social development dimension, which adopts a broad categorization of persons with disabilities and that Croatia is one of the 7 countries that ratified it (as of October 30, 2007), the HRC will continue to promote the rights of people with disabilities in the upcoming year.