Foreword to the First Edition One of the reasons for the success of the Helsinki Final Act was the agreement by all signatory States to publish the document and disseminate it in their countries as widely as possible. This enabled the citizens of the participating States to inform themselves about the commitments their governments had undertaken and to call their country’s leadership to account for failing to put these commitments into practice. By publishing and distributing this compilation, the OSCE/ODIHR seeks to contribute to a better knowledge and understanding of OSCE commitments in the field of the human dimension — among the OSCE governments as well as among the citizens and civil society actors in the OSCE region. I strongly hope that this publication thus will ultimately also foster further progress in the implementation of these commitments by the governments of the OSCE participating States. Ambassador Gérard Stoudmann Director of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, 1997-2002 xii OSCE Human Dimension Commitments