We Have A Dream: A Global Summit Against Discrimination and Persecution

We Have A Dream: Global Summit Against Discrimination and Persecution was an international summit organized by the Geneva-based non-governmental organization UN Watch, and attended by an international collection of non-governmental organizations to discuss issues of discrimination and persecution, particularly those of racism, sexism, homophobia, and discrimination against minorities.[1] It occurred over two days, September 21 and 22 of 2011, across the street from a United Nations conference referred to as Durban III.[2][3]

The summit was created in response to the United Nations' inclusion of countries that commit particularly atrocious human rights abuses, especially in the Human Rights Council, such as China, Syria, Sudan, Zimbabwe, North Korea, and Iran.[4][5] This claim has been supported by the Human Rights Foundation, a partner of the summit, whose President, Thor Halvorssen, refers to Durban III as “the last act in a tragicomedy” that underscores the UN’s complacency with “despotic regimes which speak pretty words about human rights while they kill, torture, or jail their opponents”.[6]