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| Colaboration: Rafael Santa Cruz | Translate by Systran |
Message of the Chief of a main directorate, Koïchiro Matsuura, 23 of August of 2005.
The chosen date sends at night to the events from the 22 to the 23 of August of 1791, when it caught in Santo Domingo (today Haiti and the Dominican Republic) the spark of the insurrection that was going to be determining for the abolition from deals with slaves transatlantic and the emancipation about the towns about Latin America and the Caribbean.
In their Resolution 29 Cs/40, the General Conference of UNESCO proclaimed the 23 of August of every year “Day the International of the Memory of Trata de Esclavos and of its Abolition”.
This Day the International intends to record deals with it slaves in the memory of all the towns. According to the objectives of the intercultural project “the route of the slave”, offers the occasion us to reflect collectively not only on the historical causes, hidden plots and forms of accomplishment of that tragedy but also on its lasting consequences for Europe, the American continent, the Caribbean and the Indian Ocean, when it does not stop the entire world.
It treats it, the slavery and their abolition belongs to history. But they do not belong to the past, because they serve to understand us a present lamentably marked by racism and the discriminations that are the legacy of so tragic episodes. In addition, they raise questions facing the future and they invite to reflect on the construction of new respectful forms of citizenship towards societies like ours, that are more and more multiethnic and pluriculturales. Finally also they leave patent that, in spite of the persistence of the most radical stereotypes and to the execution of policies discriminatorias of inaudita brutality, has taken an unexpected step towards the intercultural communication and a new opportunity has offered therefore the dialog.
This year, the commemoration of the 23 of August has a singular character because it comes preceded from the important manifestations of the year 2004, that the General Assembly of the United Nations proclaimed Year the International of Commemoration of Lucha against the Slavery and of its Abolition, provoking with it a strong mobilization in many countries and not few hopes. This year agrees in addition with the tenth anniversary to the project “the route of the slave”, whose evaluation put of relief the interest and the expectations that wakes up everywhere in the world.
The dynamics generated by the Year the International invites to us to redouble efforts to obtain that the whole humanity sees and feels deals with it slaves like an own tragedy. UNESCO must have to conserve the historical memory, but not only that: also it has an ethical obligation of monitoring.
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