Decade for Action to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination

Racial discrimination is a scourge as mortal to the human race as hunger and war, and has been condemned in numerous UN declarations, resolutions and agreements, including the Organization's Charter itself. The most recent effort by the Organization to extirpate the many deeply ingrained practices and opinions involved was to launch a Programme for a Decade for Action to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination. The General Assembly approved the Programme in 1973 and decided that the Decade should begin on 10 December 1973, the anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Nations are once again called on to implement economic, social, cultural, political and legislative measures to eliminate racial discrimination and to educate public opinion by all possible means to the evils of such discrimination.

African reference or pass book, symbol the complex system of laws enacted by white people in South Africa to control the movements of black people in the same country. [Exact date unknown]

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