A commitment to human rights cannot be fostered simply through the transmission of knowledge. Action and experience play a crucial role in the learning process.

It is only through such real-life daily struggles and challenges that a genuine sensitivity to human rights can be inculcated. This is a truth that is not limited to school education: it applies to all of us.

Human rights will be a powerful force for the transformation of reality when they are not simply understood as externally defined norms of behavior but are lived as the spontaneous manifestation of internalized values.

This won't at all, of course, affect our commitment to human rights issues in and outside of the United Nations. We'll continue to pursue them.

Learning is as much an attitude as it is an activity.

The reactions of the human heart are not mechanical and predictable but infinitely subtle and delicate.