PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE

'Prisoner of conscience' (POC) is a term coined by the human rights pressure group Amnesty International in the early 1960s. It refers to anyone imprisoned because of their race, religion, color, language, sexual orientation, or belief, so long as they have not used or advocated violence.
On 28th May 1961, the article ''The Forgotten Prisoners'' launched the campaign 'Appeal for Amnesty 1961' and first defined a 'prisoner of conscience'. [1]
The primary aim of this year-long campaign, founded by the English lawyer and recent Catholic convert Peter Benenson and a small group of writers, academics and lawyers, particularly the Quaker peace activist Eric Baker, was to identify individual 'prisoners of conscience' around the world and then campaign for their release. In early 1962 the campaign had received enough public support to become a permanent organisation and was renamed 'Amnesty International'.
Under British law, Amnesty International was classed as a political organisation and therefore excluded from tax-free charity status.^[1] To work around this, the ‘Fund for the Persecuted’ was established in 1962 to receive donations to support prisoners and their families. The name was later changed to the 'Prisoners of Conscience Fund' and is now a separate, independent charity. [2]
Amnesty International has, since its founding, pressured governments to release those persons it considers to be prisoners of conscience [3][4]. Governments, conversely, tend to deny that the specific prisoners identified by Amnesty International are, in fact, being held on the grounds Amnesty claims and possess a genuine threat to the security of their country.
The phrase is now widely used in political discussions to describe a political prisoner, whether Amnesty International has specifically adopted an individual's case or not. [5]

Contents

See also

References

External links

See also

★ Amnesty International

★ Chia Thye Poh

★ Closet Land

★ Political prisoner

★ Woo Yong Gak

References

1. Keepers of the Flame: The Understanding Amnesty International, , , , Cornell University Press, ,


★ Tom Buchanan, 'The Truth Will Set You Free': The Making of Amnesty International', ''Journal of Contemporary History'', 37 (2002) pp.575-597.

External links

★ Amnesty International resource about prisoners of conscience

★ Prisoners of Conscience Appeal Fund