The Centre for Global Development, UCC in collaboration with Front Line Defenders and UCC’s Centre for Criminal Justice and Human Rights and Institute for Social Sciences 21 (ISS21) will host a lecture by Human Rights Activist, James Kofi Annan on Tuesday, December 6th. The lecture will take place in Boole II Lecture Theatre, UCC Campus, 6.00 -7.30pm. Members of the public are invited to attend and admission is free.

The talk will focus on James Kofi Annan’s experiences in working on securing the safety and rehabilitation of former child slaves under the auspices of Ghanaian NGO Challenging Heights.   James Kofi Annan was sold into slavery at the age of 6 and forced into dangerous work on fishing boats in Ghana for seven years. He finally escaped, taught himself to read, got a college education, and founded a small school to help child slavery survivors. In 2003, he founded Challenging Heights, a Ghanaian NGO dedicated to rescuing, rehabilitating and educating child survivors of slavery. Further information on James Kofi Annan is available here.   The event marks the anniversary of the UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders (Dec 9th) and International Human Rights Day (Dec 10th).