Highlights:

• Support Human Rights Day! Volunteer for UNITED SIKHS, an organization that helps to empower disadvantaged and minority communities at home and abroad now!
• UNITED SIKHS thanks our volunteers who strive to change the lives of individuals every day and without whom our work would not be possible
• We need your SUPPORT to continue to battle the injustices our community faces both internationally and domestically. Please generously support our Protect Our Identity (POI) global campaign. Donate now!

NEW YORK, USA: Violations of human rights against minority and indigenous peoples are a common occurrence across the world. At UNITED SIKHS we are passionate about responding to day-to-day human rights concerns of minorities and indigenous groups through our work. As an international civil and human rights advocacy organization, we work on legal advocacy involving individuals home and abroad, and our volunteers partake in all our projects including larger humanitarian aid work as well as educating and empowering communities. 

Human Rights Day on Thursday, December 10, is an occasion to remember the work that we do with the help of our invaluable volunteers. 

The work of UNITED SIKHS and our volunteers has assisting many who were in dire need. Recently, the legal advocacy team, along with the innumerable volunteers, helped obtain the release of torture victim, Bharpoor Singh. Singh had been arrested by the Punjabi police on false charges and then tortured. He finally made his way to Tokyo where he was put into immigration detention. After diligent advocacy by UNITED SIKHS staff and volunteers on Mr. Singh’s behalf, he has been released from Japanese detention and reunited with his wife and young children as he awaits his asylum trial.

UNITED SIKHS and its volunteers were also responsible for aiding a mother and daughter, left displaced after the brutal slaying of the head of their family, Balwant Singh, at the hands of what is believed to be the Taliban near Peshawar. 

As a global non-partisan humanitarian aid agency, UNITED SIKHS is particularly grateful to volunteers who volunteer in disaster situations to assist those most in need. Please read about our efforts in Haiti after the earthquake as we helped to shelter the displaced and served hot meals to the hungry. Also, how after the Pakistan floods, our volunteers helped provide emergency distribution kits to those affected by the floods. In addition to tackling human rights issues on a global scale, UNITED SIKHS volunteers also contribute to their local communities through massive Feed the Hungry events that provide hot meals to many homeless people. 

Our volunteers come from a wide range of backgrounds and professions but all of them have a hunger to serve and passionately share UNITED SIKHS’ vision of recognizing the human race as one and helping the disadvantaged.  If you feel like doing your part for society, why not come forward and volunteer for us. 

We would like to adknowlege the work of our volunteers, and thank them for their leadership, advice and passionate work for UNITED SIKHS causes! Click here to read more about our work.

This year UNITED SIKHS is also compiling its third annual Global Sikh Civil &Human Rights Report 2010, a document bringing together primary data and research from secondary sources regarding human and civil rights conditions that are affecting the global Sikh community. In the past UNITED SIKHS reports have been referenced by the United Nations special rapporteurs, among others. Please click here to read our 2008 report. 

The date for human rights day was chosen to honor the United Nations General Assembly’s adoption and proclamation, on 10 December 1948, of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), the first global enunciation of human rights. 

Issued By:
Herpreet Kaur
PR and Media Associate
1-888-243-1690
contact@unitedsikhs.org