AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL FICHE

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Physical Description

Scope and Content

These are four folders containing fiche.

Country Dossiers:

File A1 - 1975-1980. Cumulative index on fiche, a printed catalogue givingpublications, annual report entry, newsletter entries, date and fiche number inalphabetical order of country and the country dossier fiches.
File A2 - 1981-1984. Printed catalogue giving an annual report entry, newsletter entries, general Amnesty International material and background papers,date and fiche number in alphabetical order of country and the country dossierfiches.
File B1 - 1962-1980. Printed catalogue giving an entry for the newsletter,annual reports, briefing papers, reports on countries in alphabetical order of continent, reports on topics, general publications, date and fiche number and thepublication fiches.
File B2 - 1981-1984. Printed catalogue giving an entry for the newsletter, annual reports, briefing papers, reports on countries in alphabetical order ofcontinent, reports on topics, general publications, date and fiche number and thepublication fiches.

Administrative / Biographical History

Amnesty International was formed in 1961 by London lawyer Peter Benenson. Itsmandate is to promote CHquot;general awareness of human rights' and to oppose'specific abuses of human rights'.

Benson launched a one year campaign called 'appeal for amnesty', prompted bythe arrest of a group of students for raising a toast to freedom in a publicrestaurant. His appeal for amnesty called for the release of all peopleimprisoned because of their beliefs, politics, race, religion, colour ornational origin. The campaign grew quickly and by the end of 1961 AmnestyInternational had been founded.

The organisation's earliest activity was letter writing on behalf ofprisoners of conscience. This involved investigating a prisoners case toestablish that they were a prisoner of conscience and writing letters toofficials in that prisoners country to ask for their release.

During the late 1960's additional efforts were put into issue campaigns,publicity, education and fundraising. It was also at this time that theorganisation decided that people should only work on cases in countries otherthan their own. In 1977 Amnesty International was awarded the Nobel PeacePrize for its work.

The organisation now has more than 1 million members and supporters in

over 160 countries and territories. There are nationally organised sectionsin more than 50 countries, 34 of them in areas outside Western Europe andNorth America, and more than 5,000 local groups (in addition to manythousands of school, university and professional groups). The UK Section ofAmnesty International has more than 155,000 members. Its main office is inLondon.