We have good news about the subject of our latest letter-writing campaign - Ali Aarrass in Morocco.

At every monthly meeting our Group writes letters in support of individuals at risk, as identified by Amnesty International UK. The letters, which are written personally by each member of the Group attending the meeting, are in the form of appeals to the relevant authorities to respect the individual's Human Rights

At our August meeting letters were written to the authorities in Morocco calling on them to respect the Human Rights of Ali Aarrass a dual Belgian-Moroccan national detained in prison without adequate medical care and denied access to the outside world including his family, his lawyers and all correspondence.  His claims of torture, since his forced extradition from Spain to Morocco in December 2010 (despite requests from the UN Human Rights Committee and Amnesty International not to do so because of risk of torture, incommunicado detention and other ill-treatment and unfair trial) have not been investigated by the Moroccan authorities.

We are pleased to report that Ali Aarrass ended his hunger strike on 7 August, after a representative of Morocco's national human rights body, the National Council for Human Rights, visited him in prison that day and pledged to ensure the authorities would meet his demands. The representative phoned his family to tell them the news.

Although it was not our letters that made the difference (they had not been received by then) many other letters and faxes would already have been sent by Amnesty supporters. The work we do in writing letters really can make a difference to the way someone is treated. If you would like to help us in our letter-writing we provide full details, paper and postage and will guide you in effective ways to word a letter. Join us at any meeting on the first Monday in every month from 7.30 to 9 pm at the United Reformed Church St. Georges Road St. Annes on Sea.