A/HRC/16/37 human rights, such as the rule of law and the principle of justice. These were not always national values or State traditions. 38. The International Service for Human Rights warned about giving legitimacy to a system of values that was not consonant with international human rights norms and thus provided justification for attacks against those who defended human rights. It referred to the attacks suffered by women human rights defenders when perceived as defying traditional cultural, religious or social norms relating to women’s role in society. 39. The Global Campaign to Stop Killing and Stoning Women warned against the misuse of culture to condone violations of human rights. Violations were often justified with reference to traditional values and practices that had the effect of subjugating women and girls and abusing their fundamental human rights. The organization sought to end cruel punishment of women caused when “traditions” judged them for having transgressed the “traditional norms”, especially those aimed at regulating or controlling their behaviour and sexuality, such as laws that regulated obedience, “modesty” and freedom of mobility, and required a woman’s submission to the men in her family or considered women and girls to be the property of their fathers or husbands. The organization affirmed that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was not only a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, but also a common standard of assessment for all traditional values. The Declaration was the embodiment of positive traditional values that were universally held by the community of nations and were consistent with the fundamental dignity of all human beings. 40. The representative of the Netherlands stated that individuals had multiple identities: their religion, their nationality, their professional status. This brought different value systems with it, and one of the functions of human rights was to protect each individual and to give individuals the opportunity to choose between those identities or to combine them. Human rights were a way of protecting the liberty of the individual to choose his or her own identity. To narrow down the discussion to religious traditions simplified the question and made a caricature out of the individual. 41. According to the Foundation for Gaia, cultural rights were not only individual or collective, but could also be conceived as the rights of future generations. Colonialism had often broken up regional cultures, and they had now become minority cultures in newly created nation States. The organization considered that one could talk about transboundary cultures, and asked whether it was possible to conceive of transboundary cultural rights. 42. The delegate from the United States of America stated that the broad concept of “traditional values” remained a troubling one. The notion of “traditional values”, which was alien to human rights law, could undermine the universal principles enshrined in the international human rights instruments, such as women’s rights and the rights of minorities and other vulnerable groups. The term “traditional values” has not been clearly defined and understood, and was therefore so vague and open-ended that it could be used to legitimize human rights abuses. The inherent nature of tradition was that it evolved: what was considered to be traditional was constantly being contested and redefined. Slavery and the disenfranchisement of women were once traditions; today, most countries embraced very different traditions with regard to racial minorities and women. The idea of traditional values had been misused by some to justify restrictive and unjust treatment of lesbian, gay, bisexual or transsexual communities. The United States would continue to collaborate to reinforce universal human rights standards, and opposed the distortion of traditional values to support the imposition by States of discriminatory and repressive laws and policies. 43. The Russian Academy of Science pointed out that the problem of the universality of human rights could not be solved in an a priori manner, independently from experience, but a dialogue should be built and articulated. 10