Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home—so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any map of the world.
— Eleanor Roosevelt
One person. One name. I learned that from the people of Djorlo.
In 2006, as genocidal violence in Sudan’s Darfur region spilled into neighbouring Chad, I spent several weeks with an Amnesty International research team travelling along the Chadian side of that troubled border, documenting the impact of a string of brutal attacks against isolated villages that had left a macabre trail of death, destruction, and fear. This part of eastern Chad is arid and barren, with rocky, hard-packed earth, shifting sands, gnarled trees, and scrappy bush. It was the peak of the dry season, and only the widest and deepest stream beds had the occasional puddle with a few drops of water left.
One afternoon, we came upon the smouldering ruins of the village of Djorlo. There was no one there. No home was left intact; many had burned completely to the ground. There were bullet casings everywhere. These ruins were evidence of what was almost certainly yet another attack by Darfur’s murderous Janjaweed militia, who were descending upon village after village in the area, killing, raping, and beating hundreds of Chadians, destroying their homes and forcing them to flee. There was no one left to tell us what had happened. No bodies left behind. How many had died and how many still lived? Where had they gone? At that point, it was all a mystery.
Two days later, we came upon the people of Djorlo, around fifty kilometres away. In an open field, they had taken shelter in a small grove of those stunted trees. The villagers had fled with little, but as much as they could manage. And we were welcomed.
We gathered under the only relatively large tree, broad enough to offer shade. First, we heard the harrowing account of the attack on the village, only ten days earlier. The details were horrific, including descriptions of rape, and of elderly people and children being burned alive in their huts. Forty people had been killed. Even though they were fearful of further attacks, the villagers had taken time to bury the bodies.
I then sat with a group of elders as they provided me with names and details of the forty men, women, and children who had been killed. Most of them had been shot, often while trying to run for their lives. My notebook filled quickly with their names and ages. We soon reached thirty-nine names. Then we stopped. I asked about the fortieth name. There was a great deal of discussion. People reviewed the names in my notes, and I was asked to read them aloud several times. I asked if they were certain that forty people had died in the attack; they were. I said that it did not matter if we were missing one of the names, but that did not ease their consternation.
Time passed, maybe an hour, and I was notified that the final name had been remembered. Rather than simply being told that name by whoever had recalled it, I was asked to reassemble with the elders, back under the tree. Only once we were all seated did someone speak his name, slowly and reverentially: Haroon Yacoub. There was so much in that solemn moment of Haroon Yacoub’s name being spoken. It was not the fact that Haroon had been killed that was the point but rather it was affirming and honouring that he had lived and would long be cherished and remembered for that life. And that his name was being spoken to me and through me to the world, because they believed that would lift him up and serve his memory.
I have written Haroon Yacoub’s name on a piece of paper that I slip into the back of my new annual agenda every January 1, which is then carried with me everywhere for another year. Over almost twenty years now, it has become creased, faded, and a bit smudged. It has a mysterious water stain along one edge. It is, however, a simple reminder of an essential truth: believing that every life lived is sacred and matters, deeply, is the very core of universal human rights. The people of Djorlo taught me that.
A few days later, we returned for a final visit with them. We were moving on to another area and needed to ask some last questions and say our farewells. We were pushing the hour, as we had a strict security protocol not to be outside the United Nations compound that was our base after dark. And dusk was descending quickly. The intense daytime heat had eased, and we had the windows down in our Land Rovers as we drove across the wide expanse leading up to the area that had become home, for now, for the people of Djorlo.
We started to hear what, at first, was a low but sure murmuring sound. It grew louder as we approached and took on a floating, musical quality, like chanting. We could see as well that a number of fires were burning in the distance. At first, they were only pinpoints of light. But by the time we drove into the site, we could see that they were blazing bonfires, six of them. Sitting in circles around those fires were the children of Djorlo—probably around 200, ranging maybe from five to sixteen years old. And what they were doing was learning.
At each fire, a handful of adults were leading lessons. Older kids were helping out, teaching the younger ones. They were doing it with nothing other than sticks to write with in the sand. They were doing so even though they had lost everything and had seen loved ones killed in front of them. They were doing so even though they still lived in fear of another attack and did not know where tomorrow’s food or water would come from. But still, in the midst of all that fear and suffering, they knew how important it was to keep learning. And that it was in their hands to make sure that happened.
We did eventually have to intrude into the firelight; it was now dark and we could not stay longer. I had a chance to share my sense of wonder with one of the women helping with the lessons; she had been one of the elders who had ensured Haroon Yacoub was not forgotten. I told her that I was astounded to see that they were able to find the time to teach given the enormity of the challenges they were facing. She told me that learning was the last thing they could give up on, for that was the way to ensure they would again have somewhere peaceful to live. One sacred life. Somewhere peaceful to live. Surely, as Eleanor Roosevelt urged, those are the small places, close to home, where universal human rights begin.
As we face the enormous crises of our fractured world, so many of which rise to the level of existential threats to humanity and our planet, and as we so readily feel overwhelmed by the gravity of those challenges and powerless to make a difference, those words—small places, close to home—take on even greater import. Beginning with those small places, close to home, people find and exercise their power, individually and collectively, to demand—but also to deliver—the promise of universal human rights.
The opening eight words of the United Nations Charter say so much: “We the peoples of the United Nations determined.” Governments assembled at the United Nations in those transformative postwar years understood and acknowledged that human rights are from, for, and by the people. They do not belong to governments and are not a gift from governments. Human rights rest with the people. Yet the state of our world tells us otherwise, for governments routinely seek to shut people out of the corridors of power, where debates and key decisions about their human rights take place.
That exclusion describes the history of how Indigenous peoples have been treated in Canada. Even today, they are sidelined in decisions to push ahead with pipelines, dams, mines, and other resource development projects on their traditional lands, in the face of objections from First Nations and in disregard of their rights as enshrined in treaties, the Constitution, and international obligations. More widely, federal, provincial, and territorial governments shroud their decisions about implementing international human rights obligations and complying with recommendations directed at Canada by human rights bodies in layers of secrecy. Something that should be exceedingly transparent and marked by meaningful public engagement—what governments are doing to uphold our human rights—is troublingly obscure.
How then do “we the peoples” triumph when there are such powerful forces intent on pushing back? It begins with believing in human rights, even when there may seem to be every reason not to.
To believe in anything is a potent force. But what is it to believe? In many ways, it is elusive and beyond understanding, not simple to describe nor possible to measure.
In the Parrot’s Beak region of Guinea, in 2001, I met sixty-year-old Mabinte Banguru. Three years earlier, she had fled Sierra Leone after her husband was shot in the back by Revolutionary United Front fighters when their village was attacked.
A month before we met, Mabinte watched helplessly as those same rebels abducted her fifteen-year-old daughter and mercilessly assaulted her seventeen-year-old son, this time in Guinea. She had had no news of her daughter but feared the worst, knowing only too well the rebels’ record. Her son had not yet recovered from his injuries. I asked Mabinte for the names of her husband and children. She readily gave me her children’s names. She then paused and was silent. Obviously emotional, she exchanged words with our interpreter. He told me she was finding it difficult to say her husband’s name because she had not spoken it aloud for several years. And still his name did not come—until it did: Backarie Mambu.
As Mabinte spoke her husband’s name, we looked directly at each other. It felt as if she was telling me that she had kept his name to herself for those three years so that she would not forget, and she was now passing his name to me because she believed it would help ensure he would be remembered.
Weeks later, I was speaking at an event in St. John’s, Newfoundland. I told the story of Mabinte Banguru and Backarie Mambu. Little did I know that there was a musician and songwriter in the audience, and that as I went on with my talk, he had quietly begun to compose. When I finished, his was the first hand up. But instead of posing a question, he sang. He said it was his contribution to ensuring Backarie Mambu would not be forgotten. The song brought Mabinte’s belief across an ocean, where it floated on each note and lodged in a place forever felt in the souls of everyone the music touched.
In the face of seemingly insurmountable obstacles, it is natural to succumb to pessimism and to feel doubtful that human rights will be respected. Our own ability to make a difference feels infinitesimal. And so we stay silent and give up. But believing can overcome disempowerment, and with empowerment we see that there is a way forward. There are no guarantees, but it is always worth trying.
Across Canada, the “Have a Heart” campaign, launched by the incredible Cindy Blackstock and the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society, has empowered thousands of young people to champion the equality rights of First Nations children in the country. Over the years, numerous students in the undergraduate and law school international human rights courses I teach at the University of Ottawa have told me that their introduction to human rights came through taking part in that campaign when they were in primary and middle school. One student described it as seeing the world as it truly is, and understanding they could effect change. Over the years, I have joined several “Have a Heart” Valentine’s Day rallies on Parliament Hill, and I was always energized by the voices of young people, from First Nations and non-Indigenous communities alike, echoing off the Peace Tower and the walls of Parliament, demanding equality for all children.
Looking back on her experience of taking part in those campaign activities, Harmony Eshkawkogan, who notes that she was often the only Indigenous student in her school classes, conveys how meaningful it was to see so many students show up for First Nations children. It made her “feel like she wasn’t so alone” and gave her confidence that “our circle gets bigger.”
The roots of the word solidarity lie, in part, in the Latin term solidum, meaning a whole or undivided thing. Without solidarity, we feel alone and vulnerable; surrounded by it, we feel protected and even invincible.
In September 2014, I joined an Amnesty International research team visiting Mexican prisons as part of a worldwide campaign against torture. That brought us to the Centro Federal de Readaptación Social No. 4 (Federal Centre for Social Rehabilitation), a maximum-security prison in the state of Nayarit. We were there to visit a prisoner of conscience, Ángel Colón, a Honduran human rights and environmental activist who had once studied for the priesthood. Ángel had been arrested near Tijuana five years earlier. He was readying to try to cross the border into the United States, where he hoped to earn enough money to pay for cancer treatments for his young son.
A Garifuna, Afro-descended Black man, Ángel was subjected to vicious racism and severe torture by Mexican police and guards. He was eventually transferred to this remote prison, where he had no access to a lawyer or consular visits. He had no contact with his family, who assumed he had died or been killed while trying to reach the United States. He was not charged nor put on trial for anything. He had, however, been able to smuggle a short note out with a family member visiting another prisoner. It was addressed to Amnesty International’s office in Mexico City, and it was the first news of Ángel’s fate in five years. That is what brought us to CEFERESO No. 4.
It took well over an hour for our team members to go through seemingly endless security checks, body scans, X-ray machines, pat-downs, bag searches, and interviews before we were finally ushered into a small meeting room deep within the prison complex. Ángel was brought in, handcuffed and shackled. This was a man who had every reason to feel despair and anger. But for the next hour, it is no exaggeration to say, he boosted our spirits more than we lifted his. We had brought with us petitions signed by 2,000 people around the world, calling for his release. Tears filled his eyes and streamed down his cheeks when he heard that so many people, in so many parts of the world, were taking action to win his freedom. He asked us to assure them he was certain that his freedom was now within reach.
Five weeks after that visit, I was back home in Canada, delivering a lecture at the law school at Western University in London, Ontario. My topic was torture. I spoke at length about Ángel’s case. When the talk wrapped up, I left the lecture hall and turned on my cellphone, and a text message came through from the Mexican human rights lawyer who was representing Ángel: ¡ Ángel es libre! (Ángel is free!)
About eight months later, Ángel came to Canada. He spoke at Amnesty International events, was interviewed by journalists, and testified before a parliamentary committee about the need to eradicate torture. Among the first things he told me upon our reunion was that during those five years of being cut off from the outside world, he never gave up. He said, “No matter how bad it was, I always believed I would be free again someday. And then, when I saw all of those signatures and realized that hundreds of other people were with me as well, I knew that day had come.” And it had.
In 2008, I was back in Chad, this time researching widespread human rights violations that had occurred in the capital, N’Djamena, during fighting between the military and an armed opposition group. Thousands of people had fled across the river into neighbouring Cameroon. Countless others remained in hiding, fearful of further violence.
At an informal meeting with community-based activists, I met Céline Narmadji, the founder of a small organization: the Association of Women for Development and a Culture of Peace in Chad. She was concerned about women and girls who were at risk while hiding in their homes. Nobody knew what their needs were. As she put it, how could we take steps to protect their rights if they did not, first, know what their rights were? Something so basic and so essential but so often overlooked.
Céline was intent on reaching as many women as possible. Her focus was the impoverished, densely populated neighbourhoods on the southern outskirts of the city. She invited us to come with her. She jumped on her motorcycle and we followed in our Land Rover. But it soon became clear that, first, we could not keep up with her and, second, she was taking us along roads and paths in tightly packed neighbourhoods that were far too narrow for our vehicle. We stopped, I jumped on the back of Céline’s Honda, and we were off.
It was a memorable afternoon as we heard from women and girls who were otherwise not being heard. When we parted for the day, Céline asked me what I thought was the most important tool in her human rights work. It was her motorcycle. As she put it, that was what made it possible for her to go to women where they were, and to bring the message of human rights and peace directly into their homes. She said she had come to be known as Maman Moto.
Years later, Céline was imprisoned for her activism. Amnesty International and other groups responded immediately and launched urgent actions on her behalf. She was, fortunately, released after three weeks in detention. I was able to reach her on her cellphone soon after. She told me that the more the authorities tried to silence her, the more determined she was to continue. She assured me, “Maman Moto a encore beaucoup d’essence dans le réservoir.” (Maman Moto still has lots of gas in the tank.)
On a research trip to the western reaches of Côte d’Ivoire in 2011, with my Amnesty International colleague Gaëtan Mootoo, I saw the word about human rights spread, literally, before my eyes. We brought copies of a newly released report from earlier research we had done in the area. The title conveyed the grim nature of the findings we had documented: “They Looked at His Identity Card and Shot Him Dead”: Six Months of Post-Electoral Violence in Côte d’Ivoire. We had a sizable box of copies of the report, and those were gone as soon as we cut through the packing tape.
Soon we were coming across groups of people standing or sitting together, flipping through the report, sometimes one person reading passages to the others. This happened not only in the main city of Duékoué but in other towns and villages, like Zébly, where we interviewed survivors of militia attacks. As we arrived, I noticed a well-thumbed copy of the report lying on a bench under a baobab tree in the heart of the village—and then a young woman came along, sat down, and started to read. It was an on-the-ground equivalent of going viral.
Violence was an ever-present risk on this trip, and one of the safe places for us to stay was at Father Cyprien Ahouré’s Catholic mission in Duékoué. He had courageously opened the grounds, more or less the size of a schoolyard, to over 20,000 people fleeing deadly attacks in surrounding villages; he had generously taken us in as well. He kept a copy of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on a side table, beside the Bible. I mentioned to Cyprien how remarkable it had been to see how widely word of our report, and the report itself, had spread. With a characteristic twinkle in his eye, he asked me why I would find that surprising; after all, once the word was out, how could the truth about human rights be held back?
Excerpted from Universal: Renewing Human Rights in a Fractured World by Alex Neve, 2025, published by House of Anansi. Reprinted with permission from the publisher.
