The UDHR's Content and the Two Covenants

The first substantive block of the Universal Declaration, running roughly from Article 3 to Article 21, sets out what are generally classed as civil and political rights. These include the right to life, liberty, and security of person (Article 3); the prohibition of slavery and servitude (Article 4) and of torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment (Article 5); recognition as a person before the law and equality before it (Articles 6 and 7); the rights to a fair and public hearing and to be presumed innocent until proven guilty (Articles 10 and 11); freedom of movement and the right to seek asylum from persecution (Articles 13 and 14); and the freedoms of thought, conscience, and religion (Article 18), of opinion and expression (Article 19), and of peaceful assembly and association (Article 20), together with the right to take part in government (Article 21). These rights, largely restraining state power over the individual, were historically associated with the liberal constitutional traditions of Western Europe and North America.