Amnesty International founder Peter Benenson dies at 83
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LONDON (AFP) - Peter Benenson, the
founder of Amnesty International, the organization that placed human rights in
the global consciousness, has died at the age of 83, the group said.
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Benenson died late Friday in an Oxford
hospital, west of London.
He was inspired to start the organization
in 1961 after having read an article about two students arrested and imprisoned
for drinking a toast to liberty in a Lisbon, Portugal, then under a
dictatorship.
What began as a one-year campaign to
press for the release of six prisoners of conscience has today turned into the
world's largest human rights group, with more than 1.8 million members and
supporters.
"Peter Benenson's life was a
courageous testament to his visionary commitment to fight injustice around the
world," Irene Khan, the London-based organization's secretary-general,
said in a statement.
"He brought light into the darkness
of prisons, the horror of torture chambers and the tragedy of death camps
around the world."
"This was a man whose conscience
shone in a cruel and terrifying world, who believed in the power of ordinary
people to bring about extraordinary change and, by creating Amnesty International,
he gave each of us the opportunity to make a difference."
"In 1961 his vision gave birth to
human rights activism. In 2005 his legacy is a worldwide movement for human
rights which will never die."
Nearly half a century ago, human rights
received little attention around the world, but Amnesty International -- and
many similar organizations such as Human Rights Watch and Global Witness it
spawned -- made repressive regimes, politicians and the media take notice.
The trailblazing group's annual report on
the state of global human rights receives widespread coverage. It has been
strongly critical recently of the US-led "war on terror" and the
organization has unfailingly opposed the use of the death penalty, regardless
of the circumstance.
In the first few years of Amnesty's
existence, the London-born Benenson supplied much of the funding for the
movement, went on research missions and was involved in all aspects of the
organization's affairs.
At its 25th anniversary, he lit what has
become Amnesty's symbol -- a candle entwined in barbed wire -- and said that it
burned "for all those whom we failed to rescue from prison, who were shot
on the way to prison, who were tortured, who were kidnapped, who disappeared.
This is what the candle is for."
Born on July 31, 1921 the son of a Jewish
banker with Russian roots, he was brought up by his widowed mother, and studied
law at Oxford University.
Other activities that Benenson was
involved in during his lifetime included adopting orphans from the Spanish Civil
War, bringing Jews who had fled Hitler's Germany to Britain, observing trials
as a member of the Society of Labour Lawyers, helping to set up the
organisation "Justice" and establishing a society for people with
coeliac disease.
In 1966 he distanced himself from the movement. Converting to Catholicism, he devoted himself to prayer and literature.
http://www.amnesty.org.uk/amnesty/history/biography.shtml