RTCYPP News 3.12.17 – The Religious Track of the Cyprus Peace Process

Office of RTCYPP to highlight the joint efforts and united voice of the religious leaders of Cyprus against all forms of attacks, terrorism and violence including violence against women and girls at the Rabat+5 Symposium, to take place from 6-7 December in Rabat, Morocco. Invited by the UN OHCHR, executive coordinator of the RTCYPP will talk about the unprecedented initiative with the religious leaders of Cyprus, different faith communities and secular civil society organizations, for the promotion and respect for human rights and religious freedom in Cyprus.
The Symposium, co-organized by the Government of Morocco and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights as a follow-up to the Rabat Plan of Action and the Beirut Declaration on “Faith for Rights”, will be commemorating the fifth anniversary of the Rabat Plan of Action on the prohibition of advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence.
In addition to taking stock of the use of the Rabat Plan of Action since 2012, the symposium will conduct an analysis of priority areas, outlining good practices, based on the presentation of existing concrete projects in many parts of the world, and defining means of support to existing and new “Faith for Rights” projects at the local level, in complementarity to the Rabat Plan of Action.
The OHCHR envisages that an inventory of relevant actors and projects would be established in order to help identifying existing gaps, define capacity building approaches and linking the dots and hopes that the inventory might also strengthen the capacities of the existing UN human rights mechanisms by providing them with accurate and up-to-date analysis on environments, dynamics and early warning signs of incidents leading to sectarian conflicts and violence committed in the name of religion..
Office of RTCYPP supports the UN OHCHR “Faith for Rights” initiative and proud to serve as the platform to introduce and promote it in Cyprus.