Mr. Kyong-Whan Ahn, the chairperson of the National Human Rights Commission of Korea (NHRCK) participated in high-level talks of NIs (National Human Rights Institutions) held in an OECD headquarters in Paris, France, from January 25th to 26th, 2007. The meeting was organized by Metagora, a pilot project launched by OECD-PARIS21 on February 1, 2005 for the purpose of developing, applying, and executing evaluation methods, tools, and frameworks to assess the level of democracy, human rights, and governance. The project is financed by the European Commission, France, Switzerland, and Sweden.
PARIS21, or the Partnership in Statistics for Development in the 21st Century, is a global consortium of policy makers, analysts, and statisticians established by the United Nations, World Bank, IMF and EC to promote evidence-based policy-making and monitoring around the world.
The first Metagora Forum was held in May 2005 as an informal policy-oriented meeting where human rights and governance issues in Mexico and the Philippines were investigated, and human rights violations in Sri Lanka were discussed.
The meeting of January 25-26, 2007 was intended to develop the evidence based approach to human rights and to discuss ways to improve monitoring and cooperation. In attendance were the representatives of selected national human rights institutions and human rights experts. The forum was a time for heated discussion on human rights issues among the NI representatives of selected nations including the Philippines, South Africa, Kenya, Malawi, Mexico, and South Korea, along with a UN Special Rapporteur on adequate housing and representatives of other human rights groups.
Before taking part in the Metagora meeting, Chairperson Kyong-Whan Ahn visited the Danish Institute for Human Rights (DIHR) and the Polish Ombudsman for Civil Rights Protection on January 22nd and 23rd, respectively. When Chairperson Ahn visited the DIHR in Copenhagen, he was briefed on the DIHR activities and then the meeting moved on to the discussion of how South Korean and Danish NIs will cooperate as well as the role of NIs in the international human rights community and the leadership role of the International Coordinating Committee of National Human Rights Institutions(ICC). When visiting the Polish Ombudsman for Civil Rights Protection in Warsaw, Chairperson Ahn was given a presentation on the Ombudsman" s structure, activities, and human rights protection mechanisms, which was followed by discussion on future cooperation between the NHRCK and its Polish counterpart.
