Columbia University Libraries' Center for Human Rights Documentation & Research (CHRDR) has announced the acquisition of the Physician for Human Rights Archives, a collection consisting of records, photographs, video, audio, case files of investigative data, and much more.
The Physicians for Human Rights mobilises health professionals to advance health, dignity, and justice while promoting the right to health for all. PHR's mission has been to harness the specialised skills, rigor, and passion of doctors, nurses, public health specialists, and scientists in order to investigate human rights abuses and work to stop them.
The materials, which cover the range of dates from 1982 until 1997, include organisation and administration files, country files, and mission files. These files detail fact-finding and emergency missions and include background materials, correspondence, documents, field notes, newspaper clippings, publications, and reports. There are extensive files specifically concerning missions to the Philippines, South Korea, Turkey, the former Yugoslavia, Cambodia, and Iraqi Kurdistan.
The Physicians for Human Rights joins Amnesty International USA, Human Rights Watch, the Committee of Concerned Scientists, among others, in recognising the CHRDR as an international documentation center for the global human rights movement.
