Amnesty International was founded forty years ago to protect fundamental human rights. Peter Benenson was appalled that Portuguese students were imprisoned without a public trial in April, 1961 for raising their glasses in a toast to democracy at a Lisbon bistro.

Since that time, Amnesty chapters and members around the world work to free prisoners of conscience, gain fair trials for political prisoners, end torture, political killings and "disappearances," and abolish the death penalty. The prisoner we have adopted is Myo Min Zaw, a student from Burma/Myanmar. An example of another group's work is that of Group 23 in Houston, which has been working since March 2001 on the case of Avdo Palic, a disappeared prisoner from Bosnia.

Vision and Mission of Amnesty International

Amnesty International's vision is of a world in which every person enjoys all the human rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights standards.

In pursuit of this vision, Amnesty International's mission is to undertake research and action focused on preventing and ending grave abuses of the rights to physical and mental integrity, freedom of conscience and expression, and freedom from discrimination, within the context of its work to promote all human rights.

Amnesty generally works for:

The Release of Prisoners of Conscience - Prisoners of Conscience are people who are detained because of their religious, political or sexual beliefs, and who have not advocated nor used violence. Fair and Prompt Trials. Opposition to the Death Penalty, Torture and Other Cruel Treatment Against All Prisoners