This morning as I brushed my teeth I could hear the familiar buzzing of a drone circling above our building. I ignored the sound. Drones circle overhead all the time; you never know whether it’s just for surveillance or an impending...

14 years ago I took a call I never expected to get. I was at work, in a graduate IT job I’d drifted into after university. It was half past five. I was getting ready to go home when my phone rang. It was my Mum. She told me that my...

I’ve just spoken to a human rights activist working in Gambia. Just publishing his name would be enough to get him arrested. His powerful testimony shows why we urgently need to act to stop the intimidation of people working to uphold...

Have you got a minute? Or 67 minutes to be precise? Put them to good use because today is a special day. It is Nelson Mandela International Day, now in the official UN calendar. It marks his birthday – and makes a call to action to...

As South Sudan marks its third birthday as an independent state, Amnesty is here on 'mission', documenting human rights abuses committed by government and opposition forces in a growing conflict. I want to share an uplifting "Amnesty...

'I’ve got a trained eye… he is not just a photographer' Paranoia, fear of free speech and the ‘trained eye’ of the authorities are ensuring that public space in Russia is shrinking. This is how public protest works in Russia now. This...

‘We’re sending a message of hope’ Junior Mayema was explaining to me why he’d taken the bold step of appearing in From the Same Soil , a new film that beautifully documents the experiences of three refugees in Cape Town. All three fled...

The Indian elections are the largest voting exercise the world has ever seen. More than 550 million Indian voters have gone to the polls to elect a new government in the world’s largest democracy. The elections have been a potpourri of...

Early last Saturday morning (5 April 2014), the streets of Rio de Janeiro’s Maré complex of favelas (slums) woke up to a military occupation by around 2,700 federal Army troops. They took over from a military police contingent that had...

The only reason I’m alive is because my attackers ran out of bullets. I remember that evening – 17 December 2013 – very clearly. The look of surprise on the gunman’s face after he hunched down on one knee, took aim at me one last time...

It’s two years today since Pussy Riot climbed the steps to the altar of Cathedral of Christ the Saviour, and ‘performed’, jumping, chanting, with unplugged guitars and microphones. After a minute, they were removed from the church...