A Very Special Christmas Present

by Janice Davis

I volunteered to be the one responsible in our Zürich English-speaking group of Amnesty International for the case of Chen Zhen Ping. This is a Chinese lady who is a supporter of the Falun Gong spiritual movement, and as a result of which finds herself imprisoned and subjected to torture and degrading treatment.
She has been sentenced to eight years’ imprisonment for “using a heretical organisation to subvert the law”. Amnesty understands that she has been forcibly injected with drugs and subjected to regular beatings.
Falun Gong is a belief system that has been banned by the Chinese authorities, and its members face regular intimidation and persecution for their beliefs. Chen Zhen Ping is currently being held at Women’s No. 5 Prison, Henan Province, where an estimated 200 Falun Gong practitioners are held. Other prisoners have confirmed that the Falun Gong prisoners are daily subjected to broadcasts denouncing their beliefs and to high-pitched music unless they renounce their beliefs.
Amnesty is concerned that Chen Zhen Ping is still being subjected to torture and that her health is at serious risk.
We sent several letters, to the prison where she is held, and to various government officials, urging hat Chen Zhen Ping be released immediately and unconditionally; and that she should have access to legal representation; and should not be subjected to any mis-treatment.
And we also sent a card to her daughter, who now lives in Finland and is active in support of her mother. We sent our good wishes for her Mother and also all the family.
So it was a very special surprise to receive a parcel from Finland on Christmas Eve. It was addressed to Amnesty International Switzerland, and somehow my local Post Office thought it should be delivered to me. I was bemused : who could be writing to me from Finland ?
It was a box of chocolates from the daughter of Chen Zhen Ping, together with a card saying : To Switzerland Amnesty. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year. Thank you – help me and my Mom Chen Zhen Ping. Thank you very much !!!
So lovely. I will take the choccies to our next meeting in Zürich. And we will all enjoy.
Meanwhile – please all be aware that however little we think we are doing – just sending a letter, a card – it all makes a difference. I just did some school talks at the Kantonalschule in Sargans, and we ended up sending off eighty letters on behalf of Jabbar Sevelan in Azerbaijan. Bring it on !

Aleksei Sokolov Released!

Good News Story

A court in Krasnoyarsk decided to release Aleksei Sokolov on parole on 27 July 2011. He was arrested in May 2009 and sentenced for theft and robbery a year later, on charges that many believed to have been fabricated in response to his human rights work in defence of prisoners' rights. He was allowed to leave the prison colony shortly after the July court hearing and is now back home with his family in Yekaterinburg. Alexei Sokolov had two previous parole applications turned down on the flimsiest of pretexts earlier this year.

When Amnesty International spoke to Aleksei Sokolov he said he was relieved to be able to go back to his wife and children. He thanked Amnesty International and its members as well as the many other human rights organizations that have supported him over the last two years.

Background: Human rights defender Aleksei Sokolov, head and founder of the organization Pravovaia Osnova in Ekarerinburg, was detained on 13 May 2009 and later charged with theft. He was briefly released on 31 July 2009 but detained the same day and charged with robbery in connection with a different incident. He has been kept in detention ever since, including at times without a judicial decision legalizing his prolonged pre-trial detention. On 14 May 2010 he was found guilty of theft and robbery and sentenced to five years imprisonment. Upon appeal his sentence was reduced to three years.

Amnesty International campaigned for his release, considering him a prisoner of conscience detained solely for the peaceful exercise of his right to freedom of expression in the course of his lawful human rights activities in Russia. The Amnesty International Zurich English Group has been working on his case since 2010.

Thank you to everyone who was involved!

Amnesty’s 50th Anniversary

May 2011, supporters of Amnesty International throughout the world will be celebrating 50 years of Human Rights Action, on behalf of those who suffer injustice and abuse. Many official events are planned nationally and locally, and Amnesty has launched a series of historic posters for display, including designs by Picasso and Miro.

AI Schweiz will be no exception, and a special event is planned for Saturday 14th May in the Paradeplatz Zurich.

The Zurich AI groups want to stage a really joyful action to celebrate all the work that ordinary Amnesty members have been doing since 1961. They are inviting everyone to join them for the day in the Paradeplatz, which they intend to rename – especially for the occasion – “Human Rights Square” !
To celebrate AI Schweiz as we all know it, there will be something for everybody. Placards will tell you details of the 30 Articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. You can find out about work on urgent actions and individual cases. Visitors can write a card, supporting our anniversary message, and learn about how Amnesty really does get results. Students from Zurich’s Art College are creating an installation depicting the reality of Human Rights, in a novel and entertaining way. And there will be plenty for the children to do. They can take part in a huge memory game about Human Rights – and get an AI balloon to play with.
This is an unmissable opportunity for all of Zurich to:
• Celebrate 50 years of Amnesty
• Learn more about what Amnesty does
• Find out about Amnesty’s success stories
• And have a lot of fun !

Sometimes it feels difficult to be light-hearted about Amnesty’s work. The reality is often depressing, shameful, frustrating. But Amnesty campaigns do work ! Prisoners are released and reunited with their families ; death sentences are repealed ; the “disappeared” are found again. There is a lot to celebrate and tell the world about. So come and join in the celebration on 14th May!

Anthony Graves speaking in Zürich

Anthony Graves will be telling us his story of spending 18 years behind bars, including 12 on death row, for murders that prosecutors now say he didn't commit.

Anthony Graves thus became the 138th Death row inmate, wrongfully accused, and exonerated since 1973 - an interesting reflection of the justice system. Just months after his release, Anthony Graves comes to Switzerland to report on the death penalty and life on death row.

Date and time:
12 May · 12:30 - 14:00

Location:
Universität Zürich - Ko2-F-174
Rämistrasse 71

Nothilfe / Emergency Assistance Campaign

Amnesty International and several other groups launched a campaign on 3 February 2011 to criticize the "emergency assistance" (or "Nothilfe" in German) system in Switzerland for asylum seekers whose applications have been rejected. Amnesty International believes that the emergency assistance system violates the human rights and human dignity of failed asylum seekers.

The main objectives of the campaign are as follows:

- to force the cantons to review the emergency assistance program

- to ensure that particularly vulnerable persons, such as the traumatized, ill, pregnant women, unaccompanied minors, families with children and unmarried women, won't fall within the emergency assistance system and could instead benefit from ordinary social assistance

- to guarantee that children have the right to go to school and receive access to proper nutrition

On 7 February, a "Container Action" was organized in Zurich and which ran for one full week, until 13 February. The container symbolized the loneliness and isolation experienced by asylum seekers. It also demonstrated the inadequate space that asylum seekers live in, as well as the lack of any privacy. The container had photos and information about the emergency assistance system. Members of the Amnesty International English Speaking Group in Zurich participated in the action, collected signatures for a petition and distributed "Nothilfe" sets.

Below are a few photos from the container action in Zurich.

Cool video about the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

End the segregation of Romani children in Slovakia’s schools

The Amnesty International Zurich English Group is taking action on behalf of the thousands of Romani children across Slovakia who remain trapped in substandard education as a result of widespread discrimination and a school system that keeps failing them.

What we did

We sent a letter to the Slovak authorities, urging them to take the necessary measures to respect, protect and fulfil the right to education free from discrimination for all children and to end racial segregation in education.

We also signed colourful keys, which we have sent to the Slovak authorities. These keys symbolize the following:

- They remind the government that it holds the key to allow the Roma in Slovakia full participation in Slovak and European society.

- We want them to unlock and open up the doors in situations in which Romani children from kindergarten onwards are sometimes locked into separate classrooms, corridors or buildings, separated even at lunchtimes, to prevent them from mixing with non-Romani children.

Background

Segregation of Romani children takes various forms: in several districts, Romani children attend ethnically segregated mainstream schools and classes that often operate reduced curriculums.

In regions with large Romani populations at least three out of four children in special schools designed for pupils with "mild mental disabilities" are Roma; across the country as a whole, Roma represent 85 per cent of children attending special classes. Yet, Roma comprise less than 10 per cent of Slovakia’s total population.

Slovakia’s mainstream elementary-school system is ill-equipped and education professionals are often unwilling to provide the additional support that pupils from different ethnic and social backgrounds often need.

For many Roma, Slovak is not a first language. Cultural differences and high levels of poverty among Roma mean that they often need additional language, pre-school or classroom assistance. When these needs are not met, many Romani children fall behind and are transferred out of mainstream education – either to special classes in mainstream schools or to dedicated special schools.

Romani children who are placed at special schools or classes have very little chance of being reintegrated in mainstream education. Additionally, when pupils finish elementary school under a special curriculum, they receive lower graded certificates, which restrict them to attending special-secondary school. This involves a programme of two or three years’ vocational training to become, for example, butchers, bricklayers, shoemakers, domestic workers or gardeners.

Discrimination and segregation in Slovak schools exclude Roma from full participation in society and lock them into a cycle of poverty and marginalization.

Slovakia’s 2008 Schools Act bans all forms of discrimination, particularly segregation. But it fails to clearly define segregation, or include robust guidelines and measures to help education authorities identify and monitor segregation and enforce desegregation. Effective measures to implement the ban have yet to be put in place.

The new government’s recently stated commitment to eliminate segregated schooling of Roma, included in the coalition government’s programme adopted in August 2010 is, however, a welcome development.

The Slovak government has much to do to end the segregation that has an impact on a large part of the country’s population. Segregation in education means a life-long stigma for children whose future chances are brutally limited. The choices that the government makes now will affect the lives of thousands of Romani children. The government holds the key to allow the Roma in Slovakia full participation in Slovak and European society.