By Dr Bertrand Ramcharan,
Seventh Chancellor of the University of Guyana First Swiss Chair in International Human Rights Law, Geneva Graduate Institute
In my offerings in these pages, I have endeavoured to draw attention to international policies and strategies that can contribute to the process of nation-building in a Guyana of diverse ethnicities. It is in this spirit that, after reading some recent exchanges on the topic, I pen these lines as a contribution to the policy-discussion process.
The need for international policies on persons of African descent was brought to the halls of the United Nations in 2000 by the delegate of Jamaica, then participating in discussions in Geneva on the preparation of a draft declaration and programme of action for the then impending 2001 Durban world conference on racism, racism discrimination, xenophobia, and related intolerance. The Preparatory Committee for the world conference had before it a draft declaration and programme of action that had been penned by this author.