Freedom Collection
Digital human rights history repository
Freedom Collection is a digital repository sponsored by the George W. Bush Institute at the George W. Bush Presidential Center on Southern Methodist University 's campus in Dallas, Texas .[ 1] The collection documents major players in human rights and freedom movements around the world during the 20th and 21st centuries through video interviews and documents.[ 2] [ 3] [ 4] Contributors include former president of Liberia Ellen Johnson Sirleaf , Syrian dissident and author Ammar Abdulhamid , former president of Czechoslovakia and the Czech Republic Václav Havel , Chinese civil rights activist Chen Guangcheng , former president of Peru Alejandro Toledo , and Egyptian author Saad Eddin Ibrahim .[ 1] [ 2] At its launch on March 28, 2012, the collection consisted of 56 interviews.[ 1] [ 5] [ 4] As of 2022, the Freedom Collection website was last updated in 2016 and its YouTube channel, where video interviews are available to watch, was last updated in October 2015.[ 6] [ 7] It is unclear if the project is still active.
Physical collection
The Freedom Collection is housed at the Bush Presidential Center in Dallas and displays several important documents and items from human rights movements.[ 1] The first gift was an early draft of the 1963 Tibetan Constitution from the Dalai Lama and features handwritten notes in the margins.[ 5] [ 8] In 2018, Bob Fu donated a bible handwritten by "members of house churches in China while they were prisoners in Chinese labor camps ."[ 9] The Lawton Foundation donated the Presidential Medal of Freedom awarded to Cuban activist Óscar Elías Biscet in 2007 to display until Biscet was released from political prison in Cuba.[ 1] Biscet collected the medal in 2016.[ 10] In 2014, the Collection produced the short documentary Freedom Denied: Cuba's Black Spring Continues .[ 11] The following year, the archive was used to supplement high school curricula focused on "global struggles for liberty" written by the Bush Presidential Center.[ 12]
Interviews
As of 2022, the online collection has 95 video interviews, which can be organized by region:[ 13]
The Americas
Bertha Antunez, Cuba - women's rights activist
Genaro Arriagada , Chile - former Minister Secretary General
Roberto de Miranda , Cuba - professor
Rodrigo Diamanti , Venezuela - human rights activist
Alejandrina García de la Riva, Cuba - co-founder of Damas de Blanco , wife of dissident Diosdado González Marrero
José Luis García Paneque, Cuba - journalist
Jorge Luis "Antúnez" García Pérez , Cuba - human rights and democracy activist
Marcel Granier , Venezuela - businessman
Normando Hernández González , Cuba - journalist
Ernesto Hernández Busto , Cuba - writer
Regis Iglesias Ramirez, Cuba - political and civil society activist
Ricardo Lagos , Chile - lawyer, former president of Chile
Ana Lazara Rodriguez, Cuba - doctor, anti-Castro political activist
Carlos Alberto Montaner , Cuba - journalist, Castro critic
Cristal Montañez , Venezuela - human freedom and democracy activist, former Miss Venezuela
Pablo Pacheco Ávila, Cuba - journalist
Arturo Pérez de Alejo Rodríguez , Cuba - human rights activist
Horacio Julio Piña Borrego, Cuba - human rights activist
Blas Giraldo Reyes Rodríguez , Cuba - librarian, Varela Project member
Claudio Jose Sandoval, Venezuela - human rights activist
Ariel Sigler Amaya, Cuba - former boxer, teacher
Berta Soler , Cuba - Damas de Blanco leader
Fidel Suárez Cruz , Cuba - Party for Human Rights in Cuba member, librarian
Alejandro Toledo , Peru - former President of Peru , opposition leader
Armando Valladares , Cuba - poet, diplomat
Álvaro Varela Walker, Chile - attorney, human rights activist
Manuel Vázquez Portal , Cuba - poet, journalist
Greater Middle East
Ammar Abdulhamid , Syria - author, human rights activist
Mahmoud Afifi, Egypt - democracy activist
Namees Arnous, Egypt - reporter, civil society activist
Abdel Aziz BelKhodja, Tunisia - writer, democracy advocate
Abdelbasset Ben Hassen, Tunisia - Arab Organization for Human Rights president, Arab human rights activist
Sarah Ben Behia, Tunisia - freedom activist
Sihem Bensedrine , Tunisia - journalist, human rights activist
Samar El Husseiny, Egypt - human rights activist
Bahey Hassan , Egypt - human rights activist
Saad Eddin Ibrahim , Egypt - sociologist, human rights and democracy activist
Zied Mhirsi, Tunisia - global health professional, health advocate
Nima Rashedan, Iran - political analyst, cybersecurity expert
Mahmoud Salem , Egypt - author
Sally Sami, Egypt - Front to Defend Egypt's Protesters leader, human rights activist
Ahmed Samih, Egypt - human rights activist, media adviser
Mohsen Sazegara , Iran - journalist, pro-democracy political activist
Nora Younis, Egypt - journalist, human rights activist
Radwan Ziadeh, Syria - author, pro-democracy activist
Sub-Saharan Africa
Tutu Alicante, Equatorial Guinea - human rights lawyer
Birtukan Mideksa , Ethiopia - National Election Board of Ethiopia chairwoman, former judge
Max du Preez , South Africa - writer, documentarian
Frene Ginwala , South Africa - journalist, former Speaker of the National Assembly of South Africa
Jestina Mukoko , Zimbabwe - human rights activist, Zimbabwe Peace Project director
Mamphela Ramphele , South Africa - politician, anti-apartheid activist
Albie Sachs , South Africa - lawyer, first judge appointed to the Constitutional Court of South Africa
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf , Liberia - former President of Liberia
Asia
Charm Tong , Burma - Shan Women's Action Network co-founder, human rights activist
Cheery Zahau , Burma - human rights activist, writer
Ahn Myeong Chul, North Korea - former prison guard turned defector, human rights activist
Cynthia Maung , Burma - Mae Tao Clinic founder, doctor
Alberto Ricardo da Silva , East Timor - Roman Catholic bishop
Dalai Lama , China - Tibetan spiritual leader
Fernando "Lasama" de Araújo , East Timor - activist, politician
Đoàn Viết Hoạt , Vietnam - journalist, democratic activist
Fang Zheng , China - Tiananmen Square protester, human rights activist
Bob Fu , China - pastor
Chen Guangcheng , China - civil rights activist, barefoot lawyer
Han Nam-su, North Korea - human rights activist
Ashin "King Zero" Issariya, Burma - Buddhist monk
Ji Seong-ho , North Korea - freedom activist
Kang Chol-hwan , North Korea - author, founder of North Korea Strategy Center
Khin Lay, Burma - women's rights and democracy advocate
Kim Kwang-jin, North Korea - banker, freedom and human rights activist
Kim Seong-min , North Korea - democracy activist, Free North Korea Radio founder
Kim Seung-chul, North Korea - freedom of information activist, North Korea Reform Radio founder
Min Yan Naing, Burma - Generation Wave youth movement founder, democracy activist
Khin Ohmar , Burma - democracy activist, 8888 Uprising leader
Park Sang-hak , North Korea - democracy activist, Fighters for a Free North Korea chairman
Constâncio Pinto, East Timor - diplomat, resistance leader
José Ramos-Horta , East Timor - President of East Timor
Rebiya Kadeer , China - businesswoman, political activist
Shin Dong-hyuk , North Korea - human rights activist
Wai Wai Nu , Burma - Burmese equality and rights activist
Wei Jingsheng , China - human rights and pro-democracy activist, The Fifth Modernization writer
Zin Mar Aung , Burma - politician, former MP
Europe
Czeslaw Bielecki, Poland - architect, anti-communism activist
Bogdan Borusewicz , Poland - Deputy Marshal of the Polish Senate, democratic opposition activist
Martin Bútora , Slovakia - sociologist, diplomat
Andrzej Celiński , Poland - politician, democratic opposition activist
Andrzej Gwiazda and Joanna Duda-Gwiazda, Poland - he is an engineer and opposition leader; both anti-communist activists
Václav Havel , Czech Republic - writer, last president of Czechoslovakia /first of the Czech Republic
Vytautas Landsbergis , Lithuania - politician, first Seimas speaker after Lithuania's split from the USSR
Zbigniew and Zofia Romaszewski, Poland - politician, human rights activist and his wife
Karel Schwarzenberg , Czech Republic - former Minister of Foreign Affairs , former MP
Alexandr Vondra , Czech Republic - diplomat, former Defence Minister
Lech Wałęsa , Poland - Nobel Peace Prize laureate, former President of Poland (first to be elected by popular vote)
Bronisław Wildstein , Poland - journalist, Wildstein list creator
Viktor Yushchenko , Ukraine - former President of Ukraine , opposition leader
References