RS/RELIGIOUS STUDIES - AMNESTY - ABOUT AMNESTY

What is AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL?

This organisation helps people who have had their basic human rights taken away.

It fights particularly for those who are PRISONERS OF CONSCIENCE. A Prisoner of Conscience is someone who is put in prison because they have the “wrong” race, religion, language, skin colour, nationality or political beliefs.
These prisoners often don’t have a fair trial, and brutal torture may be used to force them to confess to crimes they are innocent of.

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL was founded in 1961 by Peter Benenson, a British lawyer, who died in February 2005. Today it has over one million members across the world.

Amnesty International aims to:

• Seek the release of all Prisoners of Conscience;
• Obtain a fair and prompt trial for all political prisoners detained without charge or trial;
• Abolish torture and the death penalty in all cases.
  

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL tries to achieve these aims by telling the world what is going on behind closed doors. They investigate and report on cases of people who have “disappeared” or who are reported as being tortured.

Members of A.I. write letters to governments, prison officers and to the prisoners themselves to show that they are unhappy with these abuses of human rights. These letter-writing campaigns are hugely successful, and the work of Amnesty International provides hope for millions of unfairly treated people around the world.

Visit Amnesty’s excellent website: www.amnesty.org.uk