participate in a 43t letter-writing group for amnesty international

sending off cards of support to Patrick and Monica.

was in support of Patrick Okoroafor, whose been literally rotting in jail in Nigeria for 14 years—since he was 14 years old. more information here

the video features Patrick’s brother, Henry, a lovely, lovely man who walked with us yesterday.

please send appeals to the Nigerian authorities and letters of support to Patrick himself and to his mum, Monica!

i’ve been too despondent to post about this, but they executed Delara despite the stay of execution. her case is now getting some proper news coverage at last. too late, too late.

by two months according to the german amnesty site. see also here

jeez, it’s cruel and inhuman.

Delara’s execution is scheduled for today or Monday. For a crime she allegedly committed when she was 17. please fire off mails/faxes immediately!

Film on Delara’s story: http://scenews.blog.com/2698913/

Your Excellency,

I am greatly disturbed and saddened by the news that Delara Darabi is in imminent danger of execution for a crime committed when she was under 18.

Iran is a state party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), which prohibit the use of the death penalty against people convicted of crimes committed when they were under 18.

I urgently request that you halt the execution of Delara Darabi immediately and commute her death sentence.

Yours respectfully and sincerely,

Addresses here

Amnesty UK has belatedly come up with an email to send to David Miliband – you can get at it here.

I’ve just sent it off.

Yes, i’ve retired this goal to make room for others, but i just sent an e-mail to Condy Rice. This is where you can go, if you want to send an e-mail, too.

This letter is from the Amnesty UK website here.

Dear Rt. Hon John Hutton MP,

I welcome the commitment that Gordon Brown has made to support a request put to the UN Security Council by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to add a further 3,000 soldiers to the 17,000 strong force currently stationed in the DRC.

I urge the UK to encourage other members of the UN Security Council to also offer their support by the time they next meet to discuss the deployment of peacekeepers later this month.

In particular I urge the UK and other Security Council members to act and agree to:
· Urgently reinforce MONUC peacekeeping contingents in North-Kivu province and in the Ituri and Haut-Uélé districts of Orientale province
· Urge all parties to the conflict to ensure that humanitarian aid agencies are not hindered in their work to provide aid to displaced people,
· Press the governments of the DRC and Rwanda to refrain from providing moral or material support to armed groups operating in eastern DRC.
· Assert that justice and an end to impunity must now have a central place in the search for durable peace in the Great Lakes Region.

I believe in activism, but I also think I should make this list more realistic. Right now I think there are things at home I can do that might be more beneficial. I sign lots of petitions on Care2.com and a few of them even related to Amnesty (though I think this might be cheating a bit, which is why I am not marking this as done). Perhaps I will come back later and do this.

Huang Qi, a human rights activist based in the southwestern city of Chengdu, was detained by plainclothed police officers on 10 June.

He is held on suspicion of ‘illegally acquiring state secrets’. No one has been able to visit him in detention, and Amnesty International believes he is at risk of torture and ill-treatment.

The “subversion” charges in Chinese Criminal Law are used to arbitrarily detain and prosecute activists, journalists and internet users, and have discouraged reporting of sensitive issues, such as human rights concerns or disagreement with the government.

Your Excellency

Re: Release Huang Qi

I am calling on the Chinese authorities to immediately and unconditionally release human rights activist Huang Qi, who was detained by plainclothed police officers on 10 June.

I urge you to guarantee that Huang Qi is not tortured or ill-treated while he remains in custody and ensure he has access to his family and lawyers and any necessary medical treatment.

I call you you to end the use of vaguely defined crimes such as ‘illegally acquiring state secrets’ to clamp down on human rights defenders.

Furthermore, I am deeply concerned that detention of peaceful human rights activists runs counter to promises made by Chinese officials that human rights would improve in the run-up to the Beijing Olympics.

Sent to: WEN Jiabao Guojia Zongli – Prime Minister of the People’s Republic of China – email address: gazette@mail.gov.cn