Scientologists Raising Awareness of Human Rights in Costa Rica
Volunteers from the Church of Scientology Mission of Costa Rica tackle human rights
abuses—including human trafficking—through education.
Costa Rica is a Central American paradise, known for its lush natural beauty, acknowledged by the United Nations Development Programme for surpassing human development standards compared with countries of the same income levels, and ranked fifth in the world and first in the Americas in the Yale University 2012 Environmental Performance Index.
But on June 19, the country came under fire from the UN Refugee Agency as “a source, transit, and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to sex trafficking and forced labor,” for which they have been cited every year for more than a decade.
Volunteers from the Church of Scientology Mission of Costa Rica, determined to come to the aid of victims of trafficking, conduct human rights awareness activities that educate people on the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The program includes human rights education in schools using the human rights education curriculum of Youth for Human Rights International.
Volunteers collaborate with concerned NGOs and community organizations, meet with officials, and hold workshops to train youth and educators to conduct human rights education. They organize and participate in conferences and forums, including the Youth for Human Rights National Forum on Security and Violence held in May 2013 and a similar program organized by the federal government the same month, to reduce violence and provide safeguards for those who are abused.
Volunteers distribute human rights booklets that present in simplified form the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and carry out petition drives to call for mandatory human rights education.
Scientologists on five continents engage in collaborative efforts with government agencies and nongovernmental organizations to bring about broad-scale awareness and implementation of the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the world’s premier human rights document.
The Church of Scientology published Scientology: How We Help—United for Human Rights, Making Human Rights a Global Reality, to meet requests for more information about the human rights education and awareness initiative the Church supports. To learn more, visit www.Scientology.org/humanrights.
Scientology Founder L. Ron Hubbard wrote, “Human rights must be made a fact, not an idealistic dream,” and the Scientology religion is based on the principles of human rights. The Code of a Scientologist calls on all members of the religion to dedicate themselves “to support true humanitarian endeavors in the fields of human rights.”