van boven: my name is dale van boven. i was the director of the united nations for human rights from 1977 to 1982. tom mccarthy: there was a lot of pressure of all kinds from certain governments, having their secret service agents in the corridors looking after what we were doing, following what the ngos were doing, threatening people, putting pressure on other governments. latin america had strong dictatorships. ngos couldn't mention government names in the commission for violations. van boven: it is inexplicable and indefensible for the united nations not to react urgently to situations of gross violations of human rights. ramcharan: it was entirely unheard of that a human rights director would take vigorous positions. everything that a senior u.n. official did was closely monitored, and so it was his great breakthrough that he decided to act, and in some instances to speak out publicly against gross violations of human rights. van boven: there is a tendency, at that time at least, that the u.n. should remain low-key. s

dale van boven: it is inexplicable and indefensible for the united nations not to react urgently to situations gross violations of human rights. man: south america in the 1970s and early eighties, hundreds of thousands of people