APYN YOU(th) September Newsletter

Looking for more information on APYN and other human rights issues? Find out more about Sarah’s view on human rights and poverty in the APYN newsletter! We’re happy to share Bushra’s story with you too. Read on!

YOU(th) Profile – Bushra Tabassum

1.Hi Bushra. Tell us a little about yourself.

My name is Bushra Tabassum, I am 20 years old. I live in Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh. I am studying Economics in University of Dhaka. I speak English and my mother language Bangla.

2.How did you learn about APYN and get involved? What interested you most?

I come to know about APYN form Facebook fan page of it. As I am very interested about the issue of human rights and want to do something, I become very much interested about Asia Pacific Youth Network and joined it. APYN gives opportunity to the young people of thin region to take part in human rights issue. So, I become interested about it.

After joining APYN, I facilitated the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) meet with my friends for APYN. It was my first involvement with APYN where I shared with my friends views about the MENA crisis and learnt a lot. Again on the occasion of International Youth Day I distribute the dignity cards and get to know about what youth think about “Living in Dignity”. Thus I get involved with APYN and I really like facilitating discussions for APYN as I learn a lot from this and I believe that youth are the agents of change.

3. What authors, books, websites, movies or ideas have influenced you?

I really like to browse internet and interested in networking and human rights so websites like Facebook, twitter and websites of Amnesty International. United Nation, Asia Pacific Youth Network influenced me a lot and I come to learn about many human rights, economic issues from these websites.

4. What is the human rights issue that concerns you the most?

The human rights issues that concern me are Poverty, Education, Gender Inequality, Health, HIV & Other Diseases, Environment Pollution etc. But the most important issue for me is education. Its concerns me most because, the people of this region can overcome the problems of over population, poverty, gender discrimination, environment etc if they are educated. So we have to ensure the right of education.

You(th) Article on Human Rights – Human Rights and Poverty

Living in poverty is a violation of human rights for a lot of reasons. Poverty means that people don’t have good access to education, health, food or housing. This means that their standard of living is not as good as those living above the poverty line. It’s impossible to say exactly how many people in the region are living in poverty, but its estimated that around 950 million people are living on less than $1.25 per day (acc. to UNDP).

The global rise in food prices highlighted just how much poverty is a violation of basic human rights. Around 44 million people (according to The World Bank) were pushed into poverty between December and June 2010 because they simply couldn’t afford to buy food produce anymore. Being able to eat is a fundamental human right and if people can’t afford this because of lack of money, then something needs to change!

To be able to eat, people need to work to earn money (which in itself can mean a lot of basic human rights will be challenged). Often, children have to work too and therefore can’t go to school. Without an education it is very hard for people to find jobs that can secure a life without any financial worries. In some countries even basic education costs, so for a lot of children it means there is no hope of having an education as their families have to spend the money they earn on food.

Lack of basic health care also steams from poverty as people either can’t afford to see a doctor or to buy medicine, or they just can’t access it. This, in turn, decreases life expectancy and creates an unhealthy living environment where disease is rife and can be life threatening. The problem of housing also comes into this as people can’t afford decent housing with clean running water so diseases can spread easily and people can’t afford to be treated. The circle continues.

All these problems, along with many more, are due to poverty. People living with no money mean that they lack a lot of basic human rights. Our world today relies on money and sadly everyone needs it to survive. Without it, people can’t have access the most necessary things in life, in other words, they can’t have access to their most necessary human rights.

Sarah Cottee

The views expressed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Asia Pacific Youth Network.