The silence of our friends

Doudou Diene is UN former Special Rapporteur on slavery and human trafficking. He is Senegalese, French is his first language, and therefore the tone and inflection of his speech in English has a certain lyricism and rhythm that engender active listening.

The atrium of Memphis City Hall has a three storey-high railing that resembles prison bars of the old-style slide-shut American Movie kind. The setting seemed apt for him to recount the stories of slaves.

Memphis is home to the National Civil Rights Museum, housed at the Lorraine Motel, site of the assassination of Dr. martin Luther King Jr. It is the venue for the International Coalition of sites of Conscience conference, drawing together museums and human rights organisations from throughout the world committed to not only the preservation of memory, but to ensuring that those memories are developed as a tool for civic action, education on human rights, promotion of tolerance and acceptance of diversity.

Doudou's remarks drew together the common thread for all of those organisations and sites present in the words of Dr. King: "in the end, will will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends." The silence of our friends who have died in brutal and bloody conflict. The silence of our friends isolated and marginalised from injuries both physical and emotional.

It brought to mind a quotation from Voltaire, himself ironically an investor in those same slave ships and the trade they plied. He said: "to the living we owe respect. To the dead we owe only the truth." Truth is, of course subjective, but is also a fundamental need for all who seek to be reconciled with a difficult and divisive past.

We ahve much to learn and much to hear. I hope to hear and learn more tomorrow from those involved in recording the experiences of Guantanamó.