Press release me, let me go

COMPETITIVE SALARY, MUST BE AVAILABLE FOR IMMEDIATE START, EXPERIENCE NECESSARY It’s rare that the executioner is the one on the wanted list , but in India this week there is a hunt on. The perversity of advertising such a post, really...

Amnesty International, the world’s largest human rights organisation, is celebrating 50 years of work tomorrow- the 28 May 2011 . As if you didn’t know. Surely you must have clocked this wonderful, harrowing piece on the BBC about...

Prisoners passing their time playing video games frankly sounds a little bit like a luxury that would ordinarily be denied behind bars, but this has been happening in China,where prisoners are being forced to play online games , as...

Awards sometimes get a bad rep. If it's (say) Ronnie Wood getting the Lifetime Achievement Award For Consuming Copious Amounts Of Drugs Whilst Being In A Top Stadium Rock Band, then you can kind of see why. (I exaggerate, but you know...

You might have noticed one or two stories around recently involving Twitter, the free speech vs privacy debate, and a certain very successful footballer. In fact its the lead story pretty much everywhere today. Today Amnestys also...

A new Amnesty report is out today “J amaica: A long road to justice? – Human Rights violations under the state of emergency to mark the one year anniversary of the sensational stand off between armed residents of Tivoli Gardens in...

Reaction to President Obama’s speech on the Middle East and North Africa looks pretty mixed to me. For example, BBC News Online’s vox pop of some voices from the region was an interesting snapshot. Mohammed in Tobruk in Libya (ie not...

As I've said on this blog before, there's always a tendency for media organisations to "move on" from an issue once the story’s been "done". This is basically what’s happened with Egypt. From those heady February days when images from...

I have spent most of the day loitering outside the Iranian embassy. It is not illegal but it is frowned upon. From a great height, through an open window, by burly looking security officials. I was there with 20 school children from...

Is Gaddafi going to end up paying an unintended visit to The Netherlands in the near future? It certainly looks possible. Of course he and others in the Libyan government are now busy sounding off about how the International Criminal...

Thankfully the judicial blinding of a man in Iran , which created a lot of news interest over the weekend, has been postponed. Majid Movahedi was sentenced to “retribution in kind” (qesas) in 2008 after he poured a bucket of acid over...

Today Amnesty International launches its annual report on “The state of the world’s human rights” , a global overview that exposes abuses in 157 countries. Needless to say, much of the focus has been on recent events in the Middle East...

Interestingly the Today programme’s big 8.10 interview this morning with US Attorney General Eric Holder went from the killing of Osama Bin Laden onto the issue of Guantánamo and also the fate of former UK resident Shaker Aamer...

Good, better, best never let them rest, until the good is better, and the better is best.This chant was always a favourite for me and my sisters when we were little- not just because it is delightfully, if simplistically, phonetically...

The appalling attacks on St Mena’s Coptic Christian church in the Imbaba suburb of Cairo at the weekend have, understandably, got everyone rattled. Violent clashes between Muslims and minority Christians are obviously the last thing...

I had just one question when I read the Guardian’s story this morning about the boat full of refugees and migrants, lost in the Mediterranean, which was reportedly ignored by NATO vessels despite its distress pleas. No-one came to the...

If, like me, you caught this week’s gripping Channel 4 News report on the aid ship trying to get into the besieged port of Misratah in Libya, you’ll know what this post is about (if you didn’t, see it here ). Reporter Alex Thomson...

As the debate continues over "enhanced interrogation techniques" (ie torture) and how they have supposedly been shown to be effective because of Osama Bin Laden’s detection and death, here are ten reasons why we shouldn't accept the...

Channel 4 might have jumped ship on that format, but here at Amnesty, we are still very into it. Today we released a new round of satellite images , which reveal the alarming rate at which secret prison camps in North Korea are...

I was on my way home from a long weekend in Norfolk yesterday when I took a call about torture. Sorry, enhanced interrogation techniques. Although I’d obviously already heard the shock news about Osama Bin Laden, it was tough to be...