Aug 03, 2007News: Gay Human Rights Activists To Hold Noon Vigil at UN
By vanrozenheim
(New York) - Human rights activists will gather at Dag Hammerskold Plaza and, led by piper John Maynard, process through the plaza, light candles and lay a wreath at the Raul Wallenberg Memorial outside the UN. Gay equality advocates concerned with the denial of basic human rights to lesbian gay, bisexual and transgender (lgbt) people will hold vigils of solidarity in cities around the world this weekend August 3rd and 4th, including Caracas, Cologne, Mexico City, New York, San Diego, San Francisco, Stockholm, Vancouver, Warsaw and Washington. The global solidarity vigils are a response to what organizers assert are a growing increase in violence and the denial of human rights worldwide against lgbt people.
“We refuse to be silent in the face of torture, discrimination and executions in Iran, of beatings on the streets of Moscow, of Lithuanian authorities preventing the rainbow flag from being carried on the streets of Vilnius. We refuse to be silent when many LGBT and HIV positive refugees, asylum seekers and immigrants arrive on the shores of the US only to encounter discrimination and closed doors,” said New York organizer Brendan Fay. “This vigil reflects a spirit of global responsibility among lgbt activists worldwide. We refuse to be silent when our families, our loves and our lives are treated as second-class across the world. We stand together from New York to New Delhi from Baghdad to Belfast,” said Fay.
Organizers are calling for the endorsement and implementation of the Yogykarta Principles, which were launched earlier this year at the UN Human Rights Council’s session in Geneva.
“These principles establish basic standards for how governments should treat people whose rights are too often denied and whose dignity is too often reviled,” said Scott Long, director of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Rights Program at Human Rights Watch. The Yogyakarta Principles were a response to documented abuse because of actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity.
Fay and organizers are calling on Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour, to ensure the rights of LGBT persons are a “priority during the upcoming session.”
“On the eve of Sweden’s National Pride Festival we remember Dag Hammarskjöld, UN Secretary General, gay man, and human rights pioneer,” said organizer Gibert Baker. Baker is also creator of the Rainbow flag, international symbol of the LGBT civil rights movement.
August 3rd also marks the anniversary of the execution of Irish humanitarian Roger Casement in 1916 (ensured with the release of his personal diaries). Casement, a gay man and human rights advocate, risked his life exposing colonial brutality and human rights abuses in Africa and Latin America.
“We join in solidarity with our lgbt brother and sisters in all areas of the world in calling for an end now to the attacks, killings and discrimination of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender,” stated George Plagianos of Axios, an eastern and Orthodox organization of LGBT Christians.
“Today we will honor the lives of Barbara Gittings, Letty Russell, Roger Casement, Simon Nkoli and all lgbt human rights advocates,” said Fay.
“We remember our lgbt brothers and sisters who suffered torture, discrimination, imprisonment and death. Dag Hammarskjöld once said ‘Life only demands from you the strength you possess. Only one feat is possible - not to have run away...’ We honor those words today and trust that the United Nations will too,” said Fay.
Participants and speakers to include:
Kelebohile Nkhereanye, Less AIDS Lesotho;
Rev.John Denaro, Pastor, St Mark’s Church in the Bowery;
Brendan Fay, UN vigil organizer and Irish Gay activist;
Rev. Edgard Danielsen-Morales, Assistant Pastor, MCC NY;
Gilbert Baker, UN vigil co-organizer and creator of the Rainbow Flag;
George Plagianos, Axios NY (LGBT Eastern Orthodox Christians);
Barbara Mohr, Dignity NY;
Scott Long, Director, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Rights Program, Human Rights Watch.
