Write for Rights 2026!

This year, our Write for Right campaign shares the stories of ten people, groups and communities from around the world whose lives have been profoundly affected by authoritarian practices.
Their experiences are different, but together they reveal a troubling global pattern, and remind us of something just as powerful: when people come together to take action, change is possible. The campaign features people from around the world as well and two cases from here in the UK.

Now is the time to start ordering resources to support your activities in November and December – we’ve produced an activist guide that will guide you through the campaign and cases, an activist booklet, that will support you in planning activities and meetings, and a set of posters to promote the campaign and your events.

Each of these can be ordered separately and will be posted out to you in late October.

✊🏽 Briefing: Write for Rights, 6pm, Wednesday 28 October

Briefing: Write for Rights - Amnesty International UK
Find out more about the Write for Rights campaign and its impact.
The Write for Rights campaign is the world’s biggest human rights event, encouraging people all around the world to show support for people enduring human rights abuses.
Explore how you can most effectively use your voice to add strength to a global campaign and come together with other Amnesty groups to share creative ideas to spread awareness and make a difference.

Together Alliance - October Summits

Join our parliamentary lobby day 2026

Capturing Political Engagement and Intelligence across AIUK

Netanyahu is still a wanted man

While a fragile ceasefire is setting in in Gaza, we know that there can be no peace without justice and no justice without accountability. Last year the International Criminal Court put out an arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu – Israel’s Prime Minister who has presided over a genocide in Gaza. Remind your community of this fact and demand his arrest by putting up these wanted posters in public spaces around your community.

You can order your poster by contacting the Activism Team.   

EVERYDAY RIGHTS - RESOURCES

• ESCR Stickers - Poverty = Political Choice 15 PER SHEET
• ESCR Stickers - I (heart) Everyday Rights 15 PER SHEET
• ESCR Badges - Poverty = Political Choice SINGLES
• ESCR Badges - I (heart) Everyday Rights SINGLES

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• Join the Urgent Action Network

Help free Egyptian human rights defender Marwa Arafa

Marwa Arafa is a mother, translator and human rights defender who advocates for children. Today, she is also a prisoner of conscience. For over six years, the Egyptian Authorities have unjustly detained Marwa on baseless terrorism charges. In April 2020, Marwa was arrested in front of her two-year-old daughter and interrogated by armed security forces wearing masks and body armour. She was then forcibly disappeared for 14 days, while her family desperately searched for her.

Marwa’s alleged ‘crime’ was helping the families of people detained for political reasons, and she’s been charged with “joining a terrorist group and financing a terrorist group and terrorists”. And her rights have been repeatedly violated. She’s been denied access to a lawyer and adequate medical care. And she’s been held in pre-trial detention for six years despite the legal limit in Egypt being 18 months.

Marwa’s next court appearance is 17 October 2026. This is our moment. It is vital that we act now to free her.

Please donate today to help fund the fight for her release.

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Are you, or do you know, a teacher interested in teaching about human rights, developing rights respecting classrooms and empowering children and young people to take action?

If so, please join us on this year’s online Amnesty International teacher training course.
This course will explore topics including:

• An introduction to human rights education
• Practical ways to diversify curriculums
• Activities to explore LGBTQ+ rights using dialogue and discussion
• How to explore refugee rights using picture books, stories and art
• How to take a human rights approach to build belonging and challenge misogyny and sexism in schools
• How to build skills to empower children to take action for human rights

More information and apply here.

New Amnesty Shop Christmas Range out now!
 

This year, we are pleased to be able to offer you 10% off everything at the Amnesty Shop, as well as FREE P&P, on orders over £75. We know that activists do amazing work for Amnesty. Buying and sending out cards and gifts from the Amnesty Shop is another way in which you can get involved and help spread our message. As always, we really appreciate your on-going support.

Many groups also buy cards and gifts at the discounted rate, to sell at stalls or Write for Rights events. All the money you make goes straight to your group fundraising efforts. Christmas cards are always very popular, so make sure to stock up on those for your stalls!

To order online please visit Amnesty Shop and set yourself up with an account and log-on.
Enter the code 10AMNGRP into the Gift & Promo Codes box on the Payment Options stage of the checkout to receive your 10% off and FREE P&P (minimum spend: £75). Our catalogue is being printed a little later this year, please email SCT from October to a request a copy.
 

Come and join us! 🙌

The Community Platform will offer a much more effective way to connect with other Amnesty Activists and Amnesty staff and strengthen the movement.

Want to know about upcoming events in your area?

• Come and check out the main Amnesty Community calendar page

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Political Organising Training Programme

New sessions of our Political Organising Training are available! Through a series of practical online workshops, you will learn how to build meaningful connections in your community, hold persuasive and non-polarising conversations, grow a team of committed local leaders, and develop a strategy that makes human rights count before, during and after elections. 
 

✊🏽 Briefing: Write for Rights, 6pm, Wednesday 28 October

Briefing: Write for Rights - Amnesty International UK
Find out more about the Write for Rights campaign and its impact.
The Write for Rights campaign is the world’s biggest human rights event, encouraging people all around the world to show support for people enduring human rights abuses.
Explore how you can most effectively use your voice to add strength to a global campaign and come together with other Amnesty groups to share creative ideas to spread awareness and make a difference.

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📽️ Social Media Skills: Creating Compelling Video Content for Social Media, 6pm, Wednesday 7 October 

Social Media Skills: Video - Amnesty International UK
This training session will give you the skills to make compelling video content for social media. We will cover the principles of what makes good video content, how to film on your phone, and how to edit and how to add subtitles to a video. It will be a hands-on session where you will put these skills into practice with the support of the facilitators. 
 
This session expects that you already have a basic understanding of how to use social media!

🖼️ Social Media Skills: How to Create Engaging Content Designs on Canva, 6pm, Monday 2 November


Social Media Skills: Canva - Amnesty International UK
This training will cover the basics of using Canva, including how to navigate the platform and create engaging designs. It will also show you how to access and use our approved templates, helping you create content that is both visually effective and consistent with Amnesty UK’s brand guidelines.
 
This session expects that you already have a basic understanding of how to use social media!

Reading for Resistance Campaign - Reading Pride - Saturday 5 September. 🌈
 

Reading Pride was such a lovely day this year! We had fascinating conversations about book censorship in UK libraries, with a lot of surprise and shock that this is happening here. Sadly, some festival goers had real life experiences of books being hidden away, story tellers being limited in what they can tell. 
This is a growing issue in our country, and we need to be aware and resist! Next steps will be to share these petitions with our local libraries and councillors. 🏳️‍🌈 

The Reading Group held its 10^thchance2dance4charity on 11 September 2026. 💃

They had great time with new and old friends - we spent the evening dancing, chatting and laughing. Our 10^th event was a special request night so everyone could choose their favourite dance track, which went down very well.

The Group raised £65.15 each for Amnesty International and for a local domestic abuse charity, Berkshire Women’s Aid (BWA), through ticket sales, raffle tickets and donations. 🙏

University of Reading Freshers Fair - Tuesday 22 September 2026.

It was also super to meet the new Uni Amnesty group committee - we look forward to working with them this year.

The Reading Group had a great day at the University of Reading's Freshers Fair this week. We were raising awareness about books being censored in UK libraries and asking people to sign our "Reading Pledge" which "stands against attempts to challenge, censor or remove LGBTQI+ and other diverse books and stories from libraries and bookshops in our area".
We now have nearly 150 signatures on our pledge so will be sharing this with local councillors and bookshops soon.
 

Mid-Warwickshire Amnesty Group at Warwickshire Pride in Leamington Spa at the end of August.

 

They had a really busy stall which included a very high participation in people signing 5 petitions, 4 of which were Amnesty ones with two on Türkiye, one on Uganda and one on Morocco / Western Sahara and 1 local one on demanding the Reform-led County Council cease their attempt to remove LGBTI and diversity books from all libraries in the county.
 
The Amnesty stickers and wrist band were very popular!

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The Runnymede Group recently had a celebration for our 35^th year anniversary. We also completed an action for Uyghur solidarity month, which was to write out an exert from a Uyghur poem on a set of bookmarks. 
 

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The Runnymede Amnesty Group turned 35 years old this year, which coincided with Uyghur solidarity month. This presented an opportunity to complete an action of solidarity with the Uyghur people and to write postcards to Ilham Tohti.

The afternoon unfolded at the Crown Inn, with guests from Woking and our former group chair, David, who was visiting from the Church Stretton group. David arrived with a pile of letters from 1991 explaining how the new group was set up, the roles and responsibilities within it, and the actions and activities that would be undertaken. Looking back – not that much has changed!

We set to work with pens and bookmarks; we used an exert from “The Weakness of Language” by Muyesser Abdul’ehed Hendan, and each wrote a line on a bookmark and decorated it. Varying degrees of artistic flair and aesthetic design were demonstrated by the words and pictures were committed to the paper and we were given pause to consider those imprisoned, despite the bustling pub around us.

All in all, it was a lovely afternoon: catching up with old friends and making new ones. Sharing a campaign action to try and remember those unable to take advantage of the human rights we all have.

The Runnymede Amnesty Group - Come and visit us on the Community Platform!
 

Thank you for all you work! 🙏
 

Copyright CADFA contact@cadfa.org 

A group of Palestinian teenagers spent 3 days in Sheringham, North Norfolk enjoying a holiday from their troubled homeland. North Norfolk Amnesty International helped with the tour which also took in Cambridge, Peterborough, Lowestoft Ipswich, and Bedford before flying home from London. The children were chosen as part of the Camden Abu Dis Friendship Associations ongoing Checkpoint scheme and they came from camps in the West Banks OPT including Jenin, Hebron, Abu Dis and Silwan in Jerusalem.
 
The group of 4 boys and 4 girls with three adult members were hosted in Sheringham and several local groups helped to make the trip very memorable. This included a boat trip to Blakeney Point to see the seals, and a beach party with members of the Holt Scouts and a Bar-B-Q hosted by Holt Scouts.
 
Public meetings in Norwich and Sheringham gave people a chance to hear the youngsters’ stories of relatives and friends being killed and imprisoned and homes demolished or taken over by the illegal Israeli settlers. When asked what her main feelings were about being in Britain one of the groups, a 15-year-old girl said, "Freedom!... and being able to walk safely in a street without fear of arrest or physical and verbal attack or being shot at! “Arriving on the Saturday, the group enjoyed their 3 days with the Amnesty group and friends also visiting the Castle Museum, Norwich Cathedral and 'The Lanes' area. 
 
Jenny, the Amnesty groups leader thanked everyone who had helped with the visit and added, "Special thanks to the 8 children who brought us joy through their company - and a brilliant piece of traditional Dabke dancing at each event!"

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The regular Gaza/Palestine/Israel Peace Vigils happen every 2 weeks and continue to attract between 30 - 50 people and have been responsible for the Group gaining new members and supporters. There was a report carried last year in one of the local 'free' magazines on the Vigils. 🍉
 

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Upcoming events:
The Norfolk Group has an AmnesTea party in October before W4R in December plus our 'Amnesty Screenings' in Cromer every 6 weeks.

Want to find out more? Come and visit us on the Community Platform!
 

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The Wells group continue to campaign for the release of their Tunisian prisoner of conscience, Chaima Issa.

At Priddy Fayre on 11 July there was an information stall with letters to sign for her release from prison; this was a good community occasion with lots on interest shown.
Letters were signed, 44 in number, and posted to the London embassy. Our big PoC fundraising day in central Wells was the annual street collection on 1 august Saturday. We want to thank all our collectors for giving up their time and also the generosity of Wells which raised £323.74 for Amnesty. 🙏

We held our first ever Teams meeting in May and our next meeting in person, at the chairman’s home, will be in September at 2.30pm and will also be on the internet. In September we have a stall at Strode College’s Freshers’ Fayre where we raise awareness in students about Human Rights across the world.

If you would like any more information about these events or the Teams link, please contact our secretary, Luna Pinto Baker, or the chairman, Ed Standhaft.

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On 5 September Amnesty Mid Glos joined together with the Stroud District Coalition for a GLOBAL AWARENESS DAY.

A great day with talks, food, activities and music.
A real family event which began with a parade led by Stroud Red Band. Their Amnesty stall was full of info and posters plus a petition relating to Dr Hassum Abu Safiya, this to the Prime Minister plus signatures for three urgent actions recently provided by Amnesty.

The Group had a slate with an Amnesty candle etched into it which kids can do a brass style rubbing and is always popular.
 

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Following a collaboration with Master's student, a translator and an artist, Manchester Amnesty Group are pleased to announce the production of a beautiful, hand-finished, booklet of the poems of UAE political prisoner, Ahmed Mansoor.

The booklet contains some information about Manchester Amnesty and our work, and a selection of Ahmed Mansoor's poems. We are planning a launch event for the booklet later in the year. Stay tuned for details. 

We extend our thanks to all who have been involved in this project.

Come and visit us on the Community Platform!

COPYRIGHT PHOTO BY: AURIEL GLANVILLE, 127 FLORENCE ROAD, WIMBLEDON, LONDON, SW19 8TL
Tel: 020 8669 5781 / Mobile: 07837 910072

From 1 September to 1 October Croydon Amnesty exhibited the exhibition Surviving Evin at the Croydon Clocktower Cafe.
 

On 5 September, there was an opening of the event which the Civic Mayor and Mayoress, Sarah Jones MP, a journalist from Thomson Reuters and over 20 people attended.  Anoosheh Ashoori spoke, took questions and he presented Croydon Amnesty with a beautiful gift-pictured -which includes a pressed Morning Glory flower grown in Evin prison. We promoted the case of British national Ahmed al-Doush arbitrarily detained in Saudi Arabia. We have also had interest in the exhibition from Voice of America.

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In 2026 so far, Refugees at Home are delighted to have connected with six Amnesty groups - from Glasgow to St Albans and Manchester - running speaker sessions and inspiring people to take direct action by hosting refugees. Here is what they said:    

Mark Clixby, Kent:
Refugees at Home gave the Amnesty Kent Network an excellent and informative talk. We were joined by a host who spoke passionately about how the scheme was changing lives. We have kept in touch and plan to ask them back in 2027. 

Claire Lowe, Glasgow West:
We appreciated Refugees at Home meeting with us to tell us about their fantastic programme, clearly a carefully designed project with holistic care for both hosts and guests. Our group had lots of questions and the description of hosting as a powerful form of ‘quiet activism’ was particularly motivating.

Alison Wearden, Manchester:
We have long campaigned for the rights of refugees, so members were very interested in this talk which aligned closely with our values and suggested another way in which we could support refugees. One of our members, who has hosted 12 refugees, spoke about the support that Refugees at Home provides as well as how much they have learned and benefited from the experience.


Interested in hearing from Refugees at Home? Email them to discuss further or request a callback to chat with one of the team. 

With deep sadness, we would like to inform you of the death of my wife, former POC Maria Gillespie, at the age of 67. She died in Palma, Mallorca on 10 June, following a series of strokes. 💮

Maria was born in Uruguay in 1958 and under the military regime of the day she was arrested in 1975 and imprisoned for 16 months, during which she was initially kept in solitary confinement and tortured on a daily basis. The authorities interrogated her about the whereabouts of her first husband, a militant trade unionist who had fled the country to avoid arrest. She was released in July 1976 after a huge campaign by Amnesty International.

Banished from Uruguay, Maria lived in Argentina until being allowed to travel to the UK in 1978, on UN papers.  Over the next 25 years, she went on to play an active role in Amnesty International, speaking about her experience, joining Amnesty delegations, granting media interviews and as a member of local AI groups in Leamington Spa, Petersfield and Chester.

Our group in Petersfield was a particularly dynamic one and, owing to our strong Latin American connections, we were allowed to concentrate on campaigning for POCs from that region, playing a part in no less than six prisoners from Peru and Cuba in the space of seven years.

Maria's ashes will be scattered in the wildflower meadow at Ness Gardens, Wirral and a celebration of her life will be held, probably in October. I see her passing as an opportunity to showcase the effectiveness of Amnesty International, especially through the latter event, and to raise funds for the organisation. 

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Daphne White - Front left

We are sad to record the death of Daphne White (1933 — 2026) a stalwart member of the Salisbury group, who died after a long illness on 19 July 2026. 💮

Daphne attended a Methodist Teacher Training college in Scotland, became a teacher of geography and later Deputy Head of Wilton Middle School, near Salisbury. Her interest in geography and global human affairs led to her becoming active in Amnesty International, both in the national organisation as Peru coordinator and with the local group where, from the early seventies, she was a regular attendee at the monthly group meetings.

She was passionately interested in the plight of others, particularly that of political prisoners. One prisoner of conscience Daphne energetically campaigned for was Dr Raul Lombardi, the Uruguayan nephrologist, who, with his family, came in gratitude to visit Salisbury following his release.

Amnesty International UK works to shine a light onto injustice and inequality and to ensure basic rights are protected and upheld, whenever they are under threat. Amnesty’s work is only possible thanks to its supporters, past and present and we want to pay tribute to everyone who is part of our history, and our future.

This is why we launched our Shine On vigils. This gives you the opportunity to pay tribute to those no longer with us, keeping their memory alive through our ongoing human rights work.

How it works:
Shine On has everything you need to host a heartfelt vigil, physically or online.

1. Visit www.shineon.org.uk to order your physical or digital vigil toolkit.
2. Alongside your toolkit, you’ll receive a welcome email and point of contact to support you every step of the way.
3. Using our toolkit including a simple how-to-guide, organise your vigil to commemorate your loved one and fundraise to support Amnesty as you do so.

If you have any questions or queries, you can get in touch
with shineon@amnesty.org.uk

A petition about human rights in the UK and beyond, into your inbox every week. Together we can make a difference.

Can you shake a bucket for Amnesty? 
We need people to help at a collection for Amnesty at London Bridge Station on Wednesday 21 October. Please contact Nick Hodgson of the Mayfair and Soho group.
 

📅 Wednesday 21 October 2026
🕑 All day action 
📍 London Bridge Station
🎫 Donations are welcome!

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