March for peace Perugia Assisi 1999

In the front line

It is common knowledge that in several parts of the world, human rights are constantly violated, conflicts continually break out and many people flee because of fame, war and violence. We read it in the newspaper and see it in the television. Even though we know these facts, it doesn’t mean always to be aware of them. To sensitize people on these problems we need to understand them deeply and identify them in ourselves. We would like them to read through face observation in order to understand their emotions and hear their direct witnesses. We have always opprtunity to meet people of this tipe. In these days, a unique occasion is offered to us by the presence of 140 people who want to tell their stories about poverty, violence, and also about their fights for peace, reconciliation, the respect for human rights and human development. Among the many activities organised by the round table of peace, whithin the march peace assembly, Amnesty International, well known movement for defending human rights, proposes a moment of reflection to take witnesses on persecution and injustice.

Introduced by Guido Piccoli, expert journalist of Colombia, the evenig guests are human rights supporters, poeople who face difficult and dangerous siuations. People active in the front line like Isac Lappia, director of AI in Skerra Leone, country devastated by civil war, everybody against everybody like Tom Kamara, liberian refugee, journalist and opponent to military regime.

Ameen Ayodele is a member of nigerian section of Amnesty International. During a visit to the near Tongo he was arrested, detained and tortured for 72 hours.

Magdaleno Rose- Avila is fighting for the abolition of death penalty in the USA.

Passang Damcho, tibetan exile, talks about devastating consequences of the 50 years of chinese occupation.

Mohammed Osmar comes from Indonesia, country which has recently hit the headlines for the atrocities and massacre in Timor Est. It could have been easy to invite other guests in their place, with many significant stories. For example on Sudan Afghanistan, Algeria, or on Kurds, or Rwanda or Kosovo. The choice has been fortuitous, but not much. We wanted to give voice to unheard people, preferring over them apparently more dramatic events. According to Amnesty, human right violations should be fought everywhere.

Friday 24 September at 9 o’ clock at Casa dell’Associazionismo in via della Viola 1, you can touch with your own hands the unexpressed violations, exposed by human rights defenders themselves working in the front line.