Arab Charter of Human Rights - extraordinary meeting

The Arab Standing Committee of Human Rights (ASCHR) began its 3rd extraordinary meeting at the Cairo-based Arab League ( AL ) Sunday with the participation of delegations from all Arab states and a representative of the UN Higher Commission of Human Rights along with envoys from 18 Arab relevant organizations.

The AL Secretary General Amr Moussa said in an opening speech that Arabs and Moslems are under misleading propaganda that relies on baseless allegations, and claims that they do not respect human rights.

Moussa called for Arab concerted efforts to face up to those allegations through sticking to Arab values and norms which take care of human rights in all fields.

For his part, Chairman of the ASCHR Khaled al-Nasseri said the 5-day meeting would focus on completing and updating articles of the Arab Charter of Human Rights, prior to presenting it to the forthcoming Arab Foreign Ministers meeting, and then to the Arab summit scheduled in Tunisia March 2004.

The ASCHR meeting is to discuss several topics, atop of which is Israeli continued violations of human rights in the occupied Arab lands.