Amnesty International Australia
Defending Human Rights
This amazing activist gathered a group of black and white protesters, placed them in a bus, and took the fight for equality to rural Australia. On the way they got egged and rammed by other vehicles, but they also managed to edge Australia closer to equality. As a young white Australian, I didn’t know who …
Continue reading “Dr Charlie Perkins: the Australian hero you should know about”
Lionel Fogarty, a Yugambeh man born on Wakka Wakka land, is an award-winning poet and longtime Aboriginal rights activist. He spoke with Amnesty International campaigner Roxanne Moore to reflect on 40 years of political poetry, justice, revolution, and the 1967 Referendum. Q What inspired you to write poetry? A I grew up in a mission, …
Continue reading “‘Here lies a Revolutionary’: Lionel Fogarty”
By Andrea Sophocleous Humans have been telling stories for tens of thousands of years. Today, one of our most powerful storytelling forms is film. Movies have the power to transport us into the world of the story. Whether it’s following the tenacious investigations of a pair of journalists into the corrupt conduct of a US …
Continue reading “The 7 best human rights films to watch this weekend”
Sister Jane Keogh is in daily communication with several of the young men that the Australian government has trapped on Manus Island. She visited Manus in April; here she relates the fear and danger that the men face daily. My young friends at the Manus Island detention centre are in utter fear right now, as …
Continue reading “Our friends on Manus are living in great fear”
By Imran Mohammad Somewhere in our hearts, we had hoped that we would be moved to safety by the end of October this year when this prison — Manus RPC Concentration Camp — was closed down. However, these hopes were dashed when another devastating announcement was made on 15 May by Papua New Guinea Immigration, which has …
Continue reading “All we want is a life we can create in safety”
“People would come from everywhere just to come up and shake Dad’s hand” — Aunty Pam Pederson Sir Doug Nicholls lived an incredible life. He was born in 1906 at Cummeragunga on the land of his people, the Yorta Yorta people. His early life was lived under the Orwellian power and control of the Aborigines …
Continue reading “The incredible story of Sir Doug Nicholls”
Activists in Canberra and Perth have taken to the streets to talk to the public about the harmful practices that go into making products that almost all of us have in our homes. Last week activists and staff in Canberra kicked off the week with a bang, holding a stall about child labour in the palm oil …
By guest blogger Milly Stilinovic Milly Stilinovic, like the rest of us, goes about her daily routine in ignorance of the human rights violations she is inadvertently contributing to across the span of an average day. Until the penny drops. It’s 7:45 AM on a Monday. I have managed to oversleep my alarm and have …
Continue reading “The day I realised I was contributing to child labour”
What would you do if you were presented with the opportunity to tell the Prime Minister exactly what you thought of his government’s policy on offshore detention? Our intrepid activist Victoria had just that opportunity. On my way to work last week, I was surprised to see the Prime Minister on the train platform, surrounded …
Continue reading “The day I bailed up the Prime Minister on a train platform”
By Imran Mohammad, winner of the 2016 Amnesty Blogging Competition There is a very small area of land on the western coast of northern Myanmar called Rakhine State, where a group of people are not able to speak for themselves. This cultural group, the Rohingya, is losing its people, culture, traditions, language and land. These are …
Continue reading “‘My relatives walked over 5,000 kilometers to reach Saudi Arabia’”
