Humanelaw

We are entitled to certain rights and freedoms, merely for being human beings. But how many of us are actually aware of them? Going one step further, how many of us are honored to use them, enjoy them, in their real sense? Are all human beings really born free? Are all of them really equal? If we look at the number of people being exploited and oppressed, it’s large. Big fish always eats the small fish

Amnesty International (AI) is one widely known International Non Government Organization (NGO) which works for the prevention of the violation of human rights and demands justice for those who are underprivileged and abused.

Established in July 1961 in London, this organization won Nobel Peace Prize in 1977 for its campaign against torture and in 1978, the UN prize in the field of Human Rights. Peter Benenson, the founder was moved when he read about two Portuguese students from Coimbra sentenced to seven years of imprisonment just for "having drunk a toast to liberty”. He said, "Open your newspaper any day of the week and you will find a story from somewhere of someone being imprisoned, tortured or executed because his opinions or religion are unacceptable to his government”. He then started writing about this in newspapers and magazines with the help of his friends in those fields. His "Appeal for Amnesty" made people aware of the abuses and violation of human rights by government and this later formed the basis of Amnesty International.

This organization mainly fights for those who were imprisoned merely for expressing their views. It works for fair trial and opposes torture, death penalty, exile and long detention without trial. Government is answerable to people for the injustice it does and this should stop, this is the idea AI advocates. For its works, AI was criticized and banned by many governments by 1980. Sean MacBride and Martin Ennals are two leading names who worked with Amnesty International. ’The Secret Policeman’s Balls’ was a series of fund raising events, started in 1976 by AI and was staged mainly in London. The members of AI are increasing. It is mostly made up of voluntary members, except some paid members. In 2005 there were 52 sections of it world wide. The campaign ‘Get Up, Sign Up’ was supported by 30 million pledges. Now AI is working for the challenges of globalization and for economic, social and cultural rights. The seven major areas which Amnesty deals with are, Woman’s rights, children’s rights, Ending torture, Ending death penalty, Refugees’ rights, Rights of prisoners of conscience and Protection of Human dignity. ‘Amnesty International’ is something human race can be proud of. We should support such organizations more and more and contribute towards making a free and equal social environment.