At 15:00 on May 26, 2020, Gudmundur Alfredsson, a distinguished professor of the Institute for Human Rights of China University of Political Science and Law, gave a lecture on minority rights for teachers and students of the Institute for Human Rights. The lecture was held on the Xueyuan Road Campus via an online conference and hosted by Ma Chen from the Institute for Human Rights, China University of Political Science and Law. At the beginning of the lecture, Professor Gudmundur gave a brief review about main content of the last lecture in which he reiterated the definition and essential elements of "minority", and emphasized the significance of minority issues.
First, Professor Gudmundur introduced to the students the documents on the protection of minority rights by intergovernmental organizations and non-governmental organizations. He pointed out that among intergovernmental international organizations, the United Nations has a central position in the protection of minority rights, including the General Assembly and some organizations under the United Nations, such as the International Labor Organization, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, etc. In the minority protection system of the General Assembly, there are a large number of conventions to protect the rights of minorities. For example, Article 27 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights stipulates: " In those States in which ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities exist, persons belonging to such minorities shall not be denied the right, in community with the other members of their group, to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practise their own religion, or to use their own language." This is an international standard for the protection of minority rights. In addition, the protection of minority rights is also reflected in articles 1 to 7 of the International Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination, and articles 17 and 29 to 30 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. In the Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities, the details of the protection of minorities are emphasized. Then, Professor Gudmundur also introduced relevant documents of agencies under the United Nations, such as ILO Convention No. 169 called Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, and other instruments of other organizations such as UNESCO and several regional organizations. In addition, Professor Gudmundur also affirmed the protection of minority rights by non-governmental organizations.
Concluding the introduction of the institutions and documents related to the protection of minority rights, Professor Gudmundur turned to the discussion of the content of minority rights, mainly including three aspects of equal rights, non-discrimination and special measures.
The first article of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states: "All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood." It is not difficult to find that equality means that everyone has the same opportunity to enjoy rights. Professor Gudmundur emphasized that, especially for children, equal access to the right to education is crucial. Equality is at the core of all human rights and deserves to be emphasized again and again. Equality in minority rights emphasizes two aspects: one is that minority rights are part of human rights; the other is that minority rights are the subjects of equal rights.
The second part of content of the minority rights is non-discrimination. Minorities are quantitative minorities, whose ethnic, religious or linguistic characteristics are different from those of the majority population. Minorities around the world continue to face serious threats, discrimination, and racism, and they are often excluded and cannot be fully participate in the economic, political and social life of their respective countries, and suffer discrimination in employment and education.
Special measures are the third part of minority rights. Professor Gudmundur pointed out that once equality can be fully achieved, there will no longer be a need to take special measures to protect minorities. However, in order to ensure that minorities receive equal treatment and enjoy human rights and fundamental freedoms without any discrimination at present, the state still needs to take special measures to protect the rights of minorities. Then Professor Gudmundur analyzed the necessity of special measures through examples of specific rights such as the right to life and the right to education. Taking the right to life as an example, the right to life of minorities are more vulnerable to infringement. In order to overcome the violation of the right to life of minorities, the state needs to take special measures. Taking the right to education as an example, minorities have the right to enjoy their own culture, believe in their own religion and use their own language. Therefore, education for minorities should include an introduction to the history, language, and culture of themselves. There are still plenty of problems that need to be solved urgently, such as whether it is necessary to establish a special school forminorities? And who will pay for these expenses and so on.
In the questioning session, Zhang Ying and Xu Yuqing talked to the professor about the contradiction between protecting the uniqueness of minorities and integrating them into the society, and whether social changes will affect the realization of minority rights and so on. All students benefited a lot from the discussion.
Finally, the lecture ended successfully with the warm applause of the students.
Written by Dong Yifan and Translated by Zhang Ying
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