Genesis
1981-1992 was the UN "Decade of Disabled Persons". In 1987, a global meeting of experts to review progress recommended that the UN General Assembly should draft an international convention on the elimination of discrimination against persons with disabilities. Draft convention outlines were proposed by Italy and subsequently Sweden, but no consensus was reached. Many government representatives argued that existing human rights documents were sufficient. Instead, non-compulsory "Standard Rules on the Equalisation of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities" were adopted by the General Assembly in 1993. In 2000, leaders of five international disability NGOs issued a declaration, calling on all governments to support a Convention. In 2001, the General Assembly, following a proposal by Mexico, established an Ad Hoc Committee to consider proposals for a comprehensive and integral convention to promote and protect the rights and dignity of persons with disabilities, based on a holistic approach. Disability rights organisations, including the International Disability Alliance as coordinator of an ad hoc International Disability Caucus, participated actively in the drafting process, in particular seeking a role for disabled people and their organisations in the implementation and monitoring of what became the Convention.
Read more about this topic: Convention On The Rights Of Persons With Disabilities
Famous quotes containing the word genesis:
“Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.”
—Bible: Hebrew Genesis 1:29.
But in a later context, God told the disgraced Adam, “and thou shalt eat the herb of the field” (Genesis 3:18)
“If only he would not pity us so much,
Weaken our fate, relieve us of woe both great
And small, a constant fellow of destiny,
A too, too human god, self-pity’s kin
And uncourageous genesis . . .”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)
“Power is, in nature, the essential measure of right. Nature suffers nothing to remain in her kingdoms which cannot help itself. The genesis and maturation of a planet, its poise and orbit, the bended tree recovering itself from the strong wind, the vital resources of every animal and vegetable, are demonstrations of the self-sufficing and therefore self-relying soul.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)