Create an International Environment for the Peaceful and Steady Development to Boost the Sound Development of Human Rights on the International Stage——An Address at the Opening Ceremony of the 7th Beijing Forum on Human Rights, Spet. 17, 2014

Since its initiation in 2008, the Beijing Forum on Human Rights has been bent on promoting our mutual understanding and expanding our common grounds. It has carried out very fruitful exchanges and researches around many important questions concerning human rights development, and hence attained great achievements. It has played avery constructive role in promoting exchanges about and cooperation in human rights between China and other countries, becoming an important and influential platform for international dialogs over human rights.

Foundations of “Peace” as Value for Promotion of Human Rights in Africa

This paper identifies 'peace' as a strategic value in promoting human rights in Africa. The objective is to juxtapose the theoretical and practical foundations of 'peace' as a conceptual basis for the promotion of human rights into substantive reality. It is assumed that 'peace' provides a foundation that is likely to ensure the creation of an environment that is conducive for the greater respect of all human rights. The likelihood is traced from its potential to develop a value-based approach for the promotion of human rights. In essence, the paper argues that 'peace' may be used as a strategic value in the promotion of human rights. Also, the paper does not intend to delve into Africa's political context but to concretise the argument for the use of 'peace' as a value in the advancement of human rights.

Desire for, and Reality and Predicament of Right to Peace

To make peace an aspect of human rights is an idea that appeared within nearly half a century. Studies on this issue have not been enough, and those in China have just gotten started. In order to better safeguard and realize people’s right to peace, it is of great inspiration and significance to explore the general context of mankind’s pursuit of peace, trace back the development process of peace as a human right, observe the obstacles to the institutionalization of the right to peace, and analyze why these obstacles came into being.

Human Rights, Sovereignty and Right to Peace: Equilibrium and Adaptation

Universalization of human rights is the result of reviewing World War II and the proof of the advancement of human civilization. Nevertheless, practice and protection of human rights have always challenged state authority under the context of sovereignty. The expansion of the international human rights law has reflected a growing need to reexamine state authority in terms of sovereignty legitimacy, and to place further consideration on the legitimacy of multilateral efforts.This paper argues that(1) a unique attribute of the right to peace is that the subject to fulfilling the right is an individual as well as a state. It also drives a dilemma: while sustaining the right is the duty of a state, the state’s assisting its citizens to the practice of the right to peace might be conflicting to the fulfillment of state authority;(2) it results from the view that the state is regarded as the only subject to practice the right. As such, the state might be more likely to include individuals to practice the right from a higher vision, and deal with possible disputes between the personal right to peace and the common interest in society through the rule of law. The findings further suggest that(3) a main determinant of effect in practice of the right to peace concerns how multilateral and state actors addressing the legitimate problem determines the practice of human rights norms and the compatibility between international norms and state authority.(4) The evolution from military conflicts to peaceful development across the Taiwan Strait is a concrete practice of the right to peace.

Right to Peace as Part of Human Rights: Controversy and Connotation

Peace is closely related to human rights and the realization of human rights is based on a peaceful environment. It is beneficial to the whole world to protect human rights. United Nations Human Rights Council devotes itself to the relevant declarations of right to peace, leading to heated debates between developed and developing countries. This paper holds that the right to peace roots in seeking of human dignity, and it is both individual and collective human rights. The right to peace enumerates the range of individuals and people, and it stresses the state responsibility in particular. The content of the right to peace overlaps the current international system of human rights. The core of the right to peace is non-derogable rights. We should protect it via both international human rights law and international humanitarian law during the period of war and armed conflict.

Battle of Human Rights and Anti-Human Rights in Chinese People's War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression

The Chinese Anti-Japanese War was a battle between human rights protections and abuses, between civilization and brutality, and between justice and evil. During the war, the human rights of Chinese people were completely violated by the Japanese aggressors, causing an unprecedented human rights catastrophe. At the same time, Chinese people vigorously resisted the aggression in order to defend the national survival right and safeguard the human peace against war. The history of human rights’ victory over human rights abuses tells us: aggressive wars are the most serious violations of human rights. We must protect people’s right to peace for every country in the world. In order to avoid violations of human rights by war once again, we must safeguard the international postwar order and prevent the revival of fascism, whose essences are contempt for and trample on human rights. Therefore we have to respect and protect human rights and defend both the collective rights of every nation and the individual rights of every person in the world.

Summary of the Seminar on China's Theory and Practice of the Right to Peace

On September 11, 2017, the Seminar on China’s Theory and Practice of the Right to Peace was held at Nanjing University. It was jointly organized by the China Society for Human Rights Studies(CSHRS) and the Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China Jiangsu Provincial Committee, and co-hosted by the Institute for International Strategic Studies at the Central Party School and the School of History at Nanjing University. More than 70 experts and scholars from universities and human rights institutes in China, and representatives of relevant governmental agencies and social organizations discussed in depth topics including "Research on the Basic Theory of the Right to Peace," "Practice of the Right to Peace and Peace in China," "Traditional Chinese History and culture and the Right to Peace," "Peaceful Construction of a Community with a shared future for Mankind," "Right to Peace and Irenology," and "Promotion and Discipline Construction of Irenology." This seminar has not only expounded China’s peaceful development concept and its outstanding contributions to world peace from the perspective of human rights, but also facilitated the construction of a theoretical system of human rights with Chinese characteristics.

Maintain Human Rights and World Peace: China's Remarkable Contributions

Seventy years ago, China and the world Anti-Fascist Allies won the great victory of the Anti-Fascist War. As the main battlefield on the eastern front, the Chinese People’s War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression made indelible contributions to the final victory of the World Anti-Fascist War. The Chinese people threw themselves in the War of Resistance for fourteen years. China suffered over 35 million casualties, but its people made great contributions. In the post-war era, as the world’s most populous developing country, China attaches great importance to the protection of human rights by rule of law, follows the path of peaceful development, remains a staunch force in maintaining world peace, and makes outstanding contributions in achieving world peace and human rights protection.

Evolution and Reconstruction of Meaning of Right to Peace under New Situation

It is difficult to interpret traditional connotation of the right to peace properly, when facing the increasing changes of international and domestic security situation. As 'the third generation of human rights', for lack of the key element of the right to peace with the intensive nature of the international collective human rights, the right to peace does not highlight the function of protecting peace. It is imperative to build the right to peace system of a Multi-layer and dual meaning, which includes the domestic and international human rights, the collective and individual rights and 'peace' and 'safety'.

Promoting the Realization of the Right to Peace to Accelerate the Peace and Progress of Mankind

Since the 18;National Congress of the Communist Party of China,General Secretary Xi Jinping has issued a series of important expositions on peace and development,whose impact is increasingly important for the current process of global governance.Xi has pointed out that Chinese civilization has upheld harmony in handling

Legalization of the Right to Peace in the Context of a Community with a Shared Future for Human Beings

The right to peace means that all people have the right to resist aggression,and to safeguard and enjoy peace.As a collective right enjoyed by a country or people,the right to peace has not been clearly established as a legal right by international laws or international conventions.This situation is closely related to the Western countries’long-term control of the individualistic human rights discourse.With the deepening of globalization and the addition of the concept of a community with a shared future for human beings in UN resolutions,peace is the common goal of all countries,and the whole of human society,and the international community is raising an increasingly higher demand for the right to peace based on the rule of law.The right to peace based on the rule of law requires that the international community stipulate the right to peace via international laws and conventions and clarify its connotations,the subjects of the right and their obligations,as the implementing agencies and ways to realize the right.