Calls to action no’s 69 and 70 refer to Aboriginal peoples’ ‘inalienable right to know the truth about what happened and why, with regard to human rights violations committed against them in the residential schools’. What is this right to know the truth.

People who have been subjected to human rights violations have a right to know the truth, as part of their right to an effective remedy. The right to know the truth even has its own day – 24 March – as proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in December 2010.

In international law, the right to know the truth is most commonly referred to in connection to enforced disappearances and action to combat impunity. It is enshrined in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and in the Updated Set of Principles for the Protection and Promotion of Human Rights through Action to Combat Impunity (2005), more commonly known as the Joinet/Orentlicher Principles.

These Principles raise fundamental issues for archivists, and for any individual or organisation with records that bear witness to violations of human rights. The right to know is closely tied to the ‘duty to remember’. For the truth about injustices and violations in the past to be established, and dealt with, the records need to be preserved, and made accessible.

Archives and records are closely related to human rights, justice and reconciliation. This fact is increasingly being asserted by the archival profession. Currently, the Human Rights Working Group of the International Council on Archives is finalizing its Basic Principles on the Role of Archivists. This document states that the enforcement of human rights and fundamental freedoms is strengthened by the preservation of archives and the ability of individuals to gain access to them.