During the last week of July and the first 10 days of August, the United Nations held its first meeting to discuss the possibility of a UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities.

Some disability leaders who are also staff of Proyecto Visión participated, including Rosangela Berman Bieler from Brazil and Washington, D.C., who participated as a member of the official Brazilian delegation; Kathy Martinez of California, who participated for one day as a member of the U.S. National Council on Disability; and Leonor Coello of Rehabilitation International in New York. Ms. Coello, originally from Ecuador, was especially proud that the elected Chairman of the UN meeting was an Ecuadorian diplomat.

Rosangela Berman Bieler, a professional journalist, helped the group produce a daily newspaper about the meeting in English and Spanish. Latin American countries are very active in the negotiations, inspired by Mexico, the country that proposed the idea of a disability rights convention to the UN. For copies of the daily report, contact Rosangela as follows: rbbieler@aol.com

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