The importance of the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights was stressed tonight at a dinner at the Waldorf Astoria addressed by UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold; Mrs. Oswald B. Lord, U. S. representative to the United Nations; and Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt, The dinner marked the observance of the 10th anniversary of the UN Declaration of Human Rights. Jacob Blaustein, national chairman for the observance of the anniversary, introduced the speakers.
The dinner was the climax of an all-day conference at the Roosevelt Hotel at which the effect of the Declaration was discussed. Speakers also discussed the international implications of the human rights scene in the United States; what needs to be done to implement the principles of the declaration, and a program for the next decade. Mr. Blaustein was chairman of the morning meeting, and Philip Klutznick, vice chairman of the observance, presided in the afternoon.
On the occasion of the anniversary of the Declaration, the World Jewish Congress addressed a letter to the president of the United Nations General Assembly proposing to end UN delay in the preparation of human rights’ Covenants. The WJC urged that each General Assembly adopt and recommend for ratification a Covenant embodying one right or a group of rights. The letter was signed by Dr. Maurice Perlzweig. For more than four years the General Assembly has been examining drafts of two Covenants for the implementation of the Universal Declaration following several years’ preparatory work by the UN Commission on Human Rights.
“We cannot overlook the melancholy fact that the international community has so far failed to adopt the Covenants on Human Rights for which the Universal Declaration was intended to be the preparation and prologue,” Dr. Perlzweig said. “Though the draft texts of these instruments have been before the General Assembly for a number of years, and though many distinguished delegates have labored over them with exemplary devotion, the end of all this work is not yet even in sight.”
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