A tale of violence and dictators

This weekend has been a busy one for the press team. Its been a heady mix of dictators and violence.

Terrible violent attacks and strife continues to flare up throughout Kenya. 19 people were burned to death yesterday after a mob of fighters set alight to a house while The Daily Telegraph reports that the violence is becoming more organised.

The silence from the political leaders in that conflict-ridden country is deafening. Kofi Annan was right to condemn the attacks in the region as systematic and gross rights abuses.  Much more political intervention and direction from the leaders of the parties is required in this situation to quell the violence.

Also on Sunday, the former dictator of Indonesia, General Suharto, died. His daughter, as reported in todays Guardian, has asked for forgiveness for all his mistakes.

Forgiveness is one thing, but we are talking about a man who was responsible for the deaths of over half a million of his political opponents, the effective censorship of the media and the banning of political dissent.

The simple reality, as we said in our press release on Sunday morning, is that those responsible for these crimes should be tried and the victims appropriately compensated.

Meanwhile, as we mentioned in Fridays blog, another dictator Pakistans President Pervez Musharraf is visiting the UK. Pakistan has a whole list of problems at the moment and Amnesty International UKs Director, Kate Allen, has taken the opportunity to write a great piece that can be viewed on Comment is Free.

There were also a good article in The Guardian on the visit and widespread coverage of Saturdays demonstration on BBC radio. Even The Sunday Express covered it.