Preface by Kofi Kumado, HURIDOCS Chairperson Human rights organisations all over the world perform various kinds of work. There are those who engage in human rights education. There are those who respond to the needs of victims, immediately after the violations, and long after they have been committed, such as through rehabilitation and by claiming compensation. One fundamental characteristic of genuine human rights organisations, whatever their focus of work, is the bias for truth. Truth is the foundation of justice. Human rights organisations must always strive to bring out the truth in its entirety as much as possible. This revised book is a tool for the quest of truth. With it, it is possible to compile comprehensive data that tell in the most minute detail what became of a single victim. It is equally possible to compile comprehensive data that tell what happened to a whole country. This revised book takes into account the many discussions that have taken place since the publication of the first edition in 1993. The current formats reflect the approach of viewing civil and political rights and economic, social and cultural rights together. We are proud to be part of the growing movement to translate the principle of the indivisibility of human rights into practice. This book is about the "events" methodology. Ever since human rights organisations started documenting human rights violations, the "events" methodology has been put to use. It is a methodology that continues to be very relevant and useful as it was the first time it was used. To the human rights activist, each case of extra-judicial killing is one too many. Other monitoring approaches are being studied and adapted by HURIDOCS, for example in its project on developing tools for monitoring economic, social and cultural rights which it implements jointly with the Science and Human Rights Programme of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The goal is to build an extensive array of tools to be used in monitoring human rights. This reflects the commitment of HURIDOCS to continuously respond to the emerging needs of the members of its network. One feature of the Revised Formats is their adaptability. HURIDOCS has collaborated with different organisations in the adaptation of the formats to suit their particular needs. For instance, a network of women' s groups has customised the formats for use in monitoring violence against women. This book is also the basis of a computer program called WinEvsys, which allows organisations to build their own databases. It is developed on a platform that is readily available and powerful enough to meet needs of human rights NGOs. Its main strength is that it allows NGOs to make use of the many current helpful features of automated documentation. It is heartening to see many developments pointing toward the greater promotion of human rights over the world. We can see that in the formulation of policies of many countries, human rights occupy a stronger position. Human rights also constitute one of the areas stressed in the iv