International Film Festival and Forum on Human Rights (FIFDH)

Alain Berset speaks at the FIFDH in Geneva, during the session of the Human Rights Council. He starts from the words Charlie Chaplin dictated on 5 June 1940 for the final speech of “The Great Dictator”: “Reason. Happiness. Kindness. Humanity.” Then he links cinema and the 1948 Universal Declaration, signed at the Palais de Chaillot, which once housed the Cinémathèque française.

He pays tribute to Alain Tanner, who died in September 2022, co-founder of the Ciné-club universitaire de Genève, who “reinvented Swiss cinema”. He speaks of Ukraine, “which has become a tragic backdrop of death and violence”. And concludes: promoting threatened rights and preserving a film heritage “is also a duty of remembrance”.

Speeches on this site

• Festival du film et forum international sur les droits humains (in French, French-language page)

Sources

• Federal Council, press release of 11.03.2023