Work
The work of the Rafto Foundation is done by a small team of professionals and volunteers. The major emphasis is made on the support of previous laureates as well as educational projects, informative events and lobby initiatives.
In 2004, Rebiya Kadeer was awarded the Rafto Prize for her efforts to bring to the end social and economic marginalisation of the Uyghur people of Xinjiang. In a promotion of the human rights of the Uyghur people, the Rafto Foundation published a book, “In Our World of Good and Evil”, (2006) and assisted in a production of a documentary, “On a tightrope” (2006).
In 2000, Kim Dae-jung was awarded the Rafto Prize for his tireless fight for democracy and human rights in Korea. Since that time, the Rafto Foundation provides a significant contribution to the annual international conferences held in Bergen, Norway. The foundation supported also a production of a documentary film, “YODOK Stories” about Yodok concentration camp in North Korea.
In 1999, Gennady Grushevoy was awarded the Rafto Prize for his brave work for democracy and human rights under the Lukashenko dictatorship in Belarus. Together with the Norwegian film company Piraya Film, a documentary film, “Belarussian Waltz”, was released in 2007. The film tells the incredible story of a Belurussian painter and performance artist, Alexander Pushkin, and his brave challenges to President Lukashenko’s authoritarian regime.
In 1994, Leyla Zana, the Kurdish Parliamentarian, became the Rafto Prize laureate for her struggle for the human rights of the Kurdish people in Turkey and the neighbouring countries. In her struggle for freedom, Leyla Zana has become a symbol of a peaceful resolution to the Kurdish conflict in Turkey. The Rafto Foundation took an active role in establishing the EU Turkey Civic Commission and series of conferences in Brussels, on the Kurdish minority rights.
In 1990, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi was awarded the Rafto Prize for her peaceful struggle under a military dictatorship. Since 1990 Burma has become one of the main follow up projects of the Rafto Foundation. A close work with the Burmese community in Norway made the Rafto Foundation to take an initiative in setting up of the Norwegian Burma Committee, which at the moment is based in Oslo and runs independently from the Rafto Foundation.
Read more about this topic: Rafto Foundation For Human Rights
Famous quotes containing the word work:
“Don’t you know there are 200 temperance women in this county who control 200 votes. Why does a woman work for temperance? Because she’s tired of liftin’ that besotted mate of hers off the floor every Saturday night and puttin’ him on the sofa so he won’t catch cold. Tonight we’re for temperance. Help yourself to them cloves and chew them, chew them hard. We’re goin’ to that festival tonight smelling like a hot mince pie.”
—Laurence Stallings (1894–1968)
“Many women who used to be full-time mothers are discovering that outside work gives them friends, challenges, variety, money, independence; it makes them feel better about themselves, and therefore lets them be better parents.”
—Wendy Coppedge Sanford. Ourselves and Our Children, by Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, introduction (1978)
“What is history? Its beginning is that of the centuries of systematic work devoted to the solution of the enigma of death, so that death itself may eventually be overcome. That is why people write symphonies, and why they discover mathematical infinity and electromagnetic waves.”
—Boris Pasternak (1890–1960)