December is Write For Rights month!
Participate in our Write For Rights event
Please join us for one of the public events listed on this page! If you are unavailable on those dates, you can also sign up to Write For Rights as an individual (write letters on your own), or come to one of the events hosted by someone else. See here for more details!
Events in Orange County and Long Beach
Lakewood, Sunday 7 December 2013 (Facebook Event)
Irvine, Sunday 8 December 2013 (Facebook Event)
and others listed on the Amnesty International website
Help us write on these current Human Rights cases!
Every year, during the week of Human Rights Day (10 December), Amnesty International invites its members and the general public to participate in the Write for Rights event, where you write letters on a variety of human rights issues, supporting human rights defenders or protesting prison conditions throughout the world.
We will be writing letters to government officials protesting the abuses to which these people have been subjected. And we will also be sending cards to the prisoners of conscience and activists directly, to encourage them in their struggle! Bring some non-demoninational greeting cards with you if you can.
This year we will be writing for:
- Ihar Tsikchanyuk, from Belarus. In February 2013 Ihar Tsikchanyuk was arrested, beaten, and subjected to threats and abuse for being openly gay. He was later released without charge.
- Yorm Bopha, from Cambodia. Yorm Bopha is a 31 year old housing rights activist from the former Boeung Kak Lake area in Phnom Penh. She was arrested and jailed in September 2012 and sentenced to three years' imprisonment, despite a lack of compelling evidence.
- Dhondhup Wangchen, from China. Tibetan filmmaker Dhondhup Wangchen was imprisoned by the Chinese authorities in March 2008. He is charged with 'inciting separatism' for his work on a documentary film about Tibetan attitudes towards the Beijing Olympics and the Dalai Lama.
- Azza Hilal Ahmad Suleiman, from Egypt. Azza Hilal Ahmad Suleiman is fighting for justice after Egyptian army soldiers attacked her during protests in December 2011. The soldiers' vicious attack left her with a fractured skull, and she now suffers from memory lapses.
- Eskinder Nega, from Ethiopia. Eskinder Nega was arrested in September 2011 after making speeches and writing articles critical of the government and calling on it to respect the freedom of expression. In July 2012 he was convicted on charges of terrorism and sentenced to 18 years imprisonment.
- Nabi Saleh, in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Residents of the village of Nabi Saleh hold weekly non-violent demonstrations to demand an end to Israeli settlement expansion and related human rights violations. These demonstrations are frequently met with excessive and unnecessary force from Israeli security forces. Two protestors have been killed and hundreds injured.
- Miriam Lopez, from Mexico. Miriam Lopez was arbitrarily detained for a week. Three soldiers raped and tortured the mother of four in order to coerce a self-incriminating confession, implicating herself in drug-trafficking offenses.
- Three Bolotnaya Detainees, from Russia. Vladimir Akimenkov, Artiom Saviolov and Mikhail Kosenko were arrested when tens of thousands gathered to march on Moscow's Bolotnaya Square in protest of President Vladimir Putin's reelection.
- Albert Woodfox, from the USA. Albert Woodfox has spent more than four decades in solitary confinement after being convicted of murdering a prison guard at Louisiana's Angola prison. He has remained there, even as significant flaws in his trial rose to the surface.
- Shaker Aamer, in the USA (Guantanamo). Former British resident Shaker Aamer has been held at Guantanamo without charge for nearly 11 years.
To read more about this year’s cases, see the Amnesty International website.
Lakewood, Saturday 7 December
When
Saturday 7 December 2013
10:00 – 14:00 (10:00 AM to 2:00 PM)
Where
Angelo M. Iacoboni Library
4990 Clark Avenue, Lakewood, California 90712
Who
Sponsored by Amnesty International Group 175 (Long Beach).
What
Write For Rights! Protest Human rights abuses or cheer up a prisoner of conscience by writing a letter or a card.
How much
Free
Map to location
Irvine, Sunday 8 December
When
Sunday 8 December 2013
10:00 – 13:00 (10:00 AM to 1:00 PM)
Where
Irvine United Congregational Church
4915 Alton Parkway, Irvine, California 92604
Who
Sponsored by Amnesty International Group 178 (Irvine) and the Irvine United Congregational Church.
What
Write For Rights and baked goods sale! Write a letter, and support our group by getting some delicious baked goods.
How much
Free
An RSVP is appreciated but not required. You can RSVP with an e-mail to ai_irvine@aiusaoc.org.