The first panel of the XI International Congresso n Human Rights, promoted by the School of Judges of Tocantins (ESMAT), in partnership with the Federal University of Tocantins (UFT), received hundreds of Internet users from different parts of the world to discuss Human Rights in Pandemic times and the Inter-American Human Rights system in Confronting the Pandemic. The program will feature six more panels and will run until the next July 7th.
With the theme Fundamental Rights in Pandemic Times – Scenarios and Perspectives – the Event has the participation of renowed speakers, national and international, from countries such as angola, France, Argentina, United States and Brazil, who will speak on important related topics to this moment, lived by people all over the world, and to the post-pandemic perspectives.
The opening of the Event was attended by the President of the Justice Court of Tocantins (TJTO), Helvécio de Brito Maia Neto; having presiding Judge Marco Anthony Steveson Villas Boas, president of the Permanent College of Judiciary Schools Directors and general director of Esmat; and Professor Gustavo Paschoal T. C. Oliveira, coordinator of the Master of Jurisdictional Provision and Human Rights (PPGPJDH).
In his speech, the President of the Justice Court of Tocantins, Helvécio de Brito Maia Neto, emphasized that the Judiciary is experiencing a moment of deep transformations, administrative and technological reorganization and has the duty to provide reflections and studies that can guarantee the progress in the effectiveness of human rights. “I am sure that, together and united, we can effectively implement transformations for the construction of a safer world, being certain that this transformation necessarily passes through our microsystem of professional and personal performance”, he said. For the general director of Esmat, Judge Marco Villas Boas, the current confrontation of the global pandemic is the result of the lack of effectiveness in protecting the environment. “If we are living a disaster today, it is precisely due to disrespect for nature and degradation in all dimensions, not only of plants, water and animals, but also ecological that affects man in several dimensions.” he said.
Mediated by Professor Dr. Tharsis Barreto, on the first day, the speakers addressed the care of the most vulnerable and susceptible populations to the new disease, such as the prison population in Brazil and the United States; access to adequate treatment mainly for the African-American, Hispanic and minority populations and groups with comorbidities. In his speech, Professor Dr. Valério Mazzuoli emphasized that the current situation of the pandemic lacks a greater concern of the public authorities for the prison population. The speaker highlighted the risks of contamination resulting from the lack of minimum sanitary conditions in prison units. “Every person deprived of their liberty has the human right to receive respectful and unrestricted treatment to their dignity, fundamental rights, their right to life, personal integrity, their fundamental guarantees and the essential guarantees to protect their rights of liberty”, he affirmed.
The American speaker George Andreopoulus on the other hand, reinforced the worsening of positive cases by the new vírus in African American and Hispanic public; the need during the pandemic to maintain acces to information, to make sure that policies are based on science; in addition to access to essential health and sanitation care, such as drinking water. “Access to clean water is not just a problem for the United States. We understand that during the pandemic, access to drinking water is considered the first line of defense against the disease of some problems that the country is facing with the Coronavirus”, he Said.
Concluding the first panel, the speaker Elizabeth Abi-Mershed made a parallel between the current pandemic with the beginning of HIV infection in America and how the Black population is most affected. “The first reflection I would like to make is about racism in the United States, it is really a personal reflection to work on the American population, and the points that I am looking at here are those that are occuring in the United States about the effects of coronavirus, especially the different numbers of deaths of African-American people”, she said.
