Europa Newswire
November 11, 2009
By Amy Lieberman
Helen Bamber may have been part one of the first rehabilitation teams to enter a German concentration camp following World War II, but she still found Wednesday afternoon’s luncheon in her name “overwhelming,” she told Europa Newswire.
The Dag Hammarskjold Scholarship Fund for Journalists honored Bamber for her contributions to combating human rights abuses for the past 55 years in the United Nations’ Delegates Dining Room. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon and Academy Award winning actress Emma Thompson both commended 84-year-old Bamber for her inspiring work, especially through her advocacy and support organization, The Helen Bamber Foundation of victims of gross human rights abuses.
Landing in Germany in 1945 at the age of 20, Bamber, a psychotherapist, remained in the ravished nation for more two years, overseeing the evacuation of young concentration camp survivors. She later went on to found several organizations benefiting human rights abuses’ victims, and to also become chairman of Amnesty International in 1961.
She has worked at the forefront of human rights campaign since then, but she still said that receiving the Dag Hammarskjold Inspiration Award was “unexpected.”
“I just do my job day-in and day-out,” Bamber explained.
“People are working hard out there and people are trying,” she said. “There is always a battle to be won in terms of human rights. I never feel we are doing well enough, but we are doing quite well.”
A strong media presence plays a vital role in continuing to combat human rights abuses, Ban noted in his remarks at the luncheon. He expressed his gratitude toward the four journalists – from Ghana, Pakistan, the Philippines and Egypt – who were able to utilize their resources and write from the United Nations through the Dag Hammarskjold Scholarship, a 6-month program for journalists in developing nations.
“Everyone has a role to play,” in fighting to preserve human rights, as well as peace and security across the world, Ban said.
Actors like Thompson, whose films can reach a mass, global audience, are also indispensible in fostering awareness about human rights abuses and other pressing issues the UN is working to improve upon, he noted.
Thompson, a chairperson on the Helen Bamber Foundation, said Bamber has served as a major inspiration in both her personal and professional life, guiding her on how to transmit the pain a human rights victim might experience into her acting roles.
“I went to Helen... and the thing she said the thing you have to remember is that torture victims often lose their voice twice,” an animated Thompson explained to the luncheon attendees. “The first is during the experience of torture itself and then they experience it again when no one wants to hear about it, when they experience the rejection of people turning their heads, who don’t want to hear their stories.”
Actors, artists and journalists stand
in a privileged position, Thompson concluded, able to try and convey
the voices – and emotions – of trafficked individuals, whose stories
too often get buried in the midst of their own emotional rubble, and
never reach the public.
Photo by: Luiz Rampelotto
