Human rights have become a permanent item on the public agenda. Looking backwards, things really started happening in the 18th century, but the national and selective citizen’s rights only became actual human rights in 1948, when they were adopted by the United Nations (UN) in an international legal instrument. Today, human rights are principles of the international community, which has built several control mechanisms in both UN and European human rights systems. There are various types of human rights instruments, such as statements, declarations and conventions, but only the conventions are really binding on the states.