THE NETWORK AIMS TO PUT INTO PRACTICE THE PROFESSIONAL DUTY OF SCIENTISTS AND SCHOLARS TO ASSIST THOSE COLLEAGUES WHOSE HUMAN RIGHTS HAVE BEEN—OR ARE THREATENED TO BE—INFRINGED AND TO PROMOTE AND PROTECT THE INDEPENDENCE OF ACADEMIES AND SCHOLARLY SOCIETIES WORLDWIDE.

[Approved unanimously at the May 11, 2001, fifth biennial meeting of the International Human Rights Network of Academies and Scholarly Societies, held at the French Academy of Sciences in Paris, France.]

The International Human Rights Network of Academies and Scholarly Societies assists colleagues (scientists and scholars) around the world who are subjected to severe repression solely for having nonviolently exercised their rights as promulgated by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). It also promotes human rights consciousness-raising and institutional commitment to human rights work among counterpart academies and scholarly societies worldwide and encourages and protects their independence.

The Network was created in May 1993 at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, D.C. It has met biennially—in 1995 in Amsterdam at the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, in 1997 in Rome at the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, in 1999 in Stockholm at The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and The Royal Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities, in 2001 in Paris at the French Academy of Sciences, in May 2003 at the Centro Stefano Franscini at the Monte Verità in Ascona, Switzerland when hosted by the Council of the Swiss Scientific Academies and, most recently, in 2005 at the Royal Society in London.

The next meeting of the Network will be held in April 2007 in Colombo and will be hosted by the National Academy of Sciences of Sri Lanka.

Some 70 academies and scholarly societies have sent representatives to attend Network meetings. National academies and scholarly societies that have human rights