Witchcraft and Human Rights : From Horror to Hope

In numerous countries around the world, harmful witchcraft-related beliefs and practices have resulted in serious violations of human rights, including beatings, banishment, cutting of body parts, amputation of limbs, grave robberies, torture and murder. Under the rubric of ‘witchcraft’, individuals (often those who are somehow different, feared or disliked) are singled out for arbitrary acts of violence. Women, children, the elderly and persons with disabilities are particularly vulnerable.

With photographs by Vlad Sokhin, Joe Wood, Christo Geoghegan and Under the Same Sun, the exhibition provides a sample of individual cases of witchcraft-related human rights violations across the world. Through the 13 images in display, the exhibit highlights the need for the urgent incorporation of this issue into existing work in human rights – including through the implementation of measures to prevent and redress the serious human rights violations that emerge from harmful witchcraft-related beliefs and practices around the world.

The exhibition is organised by the Independent Expert on the enjoyment of human rights by persons with albinism, Lancaster University, Wichtcraft and Human Rights Information Network and Under the Same Sun, with the support of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Violence against Children, the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, the Special Rapporteur on the rights of persons with disabilities, the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the Permanent Mission of Sierra Leone to the United Nations Office in Geneva and the Permanent Mission of Portugal to the United Nations Office in Geneva.