With the support from the Norwegian Centre for Human Rights (NCHR), the ASEAN University Network - Human Rights Education (AUN-HRE), hosted by the Institute of Human Rights and Peace Studies (IHRP) of Mahidol University, organized an online Students Essay Competition in 2022.
The initiative writing aims to strengthen the youth engagement in human rights and peace issues in the region. The event provides a platform for undergraduate students to express their views, enhance their interest and awareness, and analyze the current state of human rights and peace in the region.
A Winners Panel was organized in Bangkok in December, as a part of the program of the “Regional Colloquium on ASEAN Human Rights Declaration” organized by the ASEAN Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights (AICHR).
The future of the ASEAN Human Rights Declaration
With the theme “ASEAN Human Rights Declaration: Ten Years On”, the competition ran from July to September 2022, seeing five winners out of a total of 170 submissions by undergraduate students from Southeast Asia. Following the review process by the expert panel, five winners were selected:
- 1st Prize: Kevin M. Maralit, University of the Philippines Diliman, Philippines
- 2nd Prize: Stanislaus Demokrasi Sandywan, University of Indonesia, Indonesia
- 3rd Prize: Angelo Obina, De La Salle University, Philippines
- 3rd Prize: Francine Ann Latigo, De La Salle University, Philippines
- Popular Prize: Nada Safira, Andalas University, Indonesia
The first price winning essay was titled “To Promote and Protect: Strengthening the Regional, National, and Individual Impacts of the AHRD on the Southeast Asia." All of the winning submissions can be accessed here.
Platform for student expression
At the colloquium in December, the winners had the opportunity to share their voice in a panel discussion along with AICHR representatives and human rights experts. The panel discussed the impact of the ASEAN Human Rights Declaration to the lives of ASEAN citizens during its first ten years of adoption and the ways forward to further raise awareness and improve the protection of human rights in the region.
More than 120 participants, including undergraduate students and representatives from the ASEAN Member States and the Norwegian embassy in Thailand, joined the event in-person and online.