Daedalus escaping from the labyrinthReady-Made
Human Rights Letters

Here are short letters that you can easily print and mail.

Select the address and text; copy and paste them into Word or whatever you use for writing. Arrange on the page to your liking.

Even better is to spend a few moments individualizing the text. You could change words, add your own remarks, use different points from the fuller information given.
A short letter in simple language is most likely to be understood. Stay polite.

Get back to us if you have a question. Or if you have the luck to receive a reply—it could be important. We'd love to know that you've written.

—Guy Ottewell and Tilly Lavenás, founder members of the Amnesty International groups of Greenville, South Carolina, and Lyme Regis, England.

The top letter on the home page is new. Others are about some long-term cases on which we keep working. More letters on them are always needed.
YOU CAN RECEIVE NEW APPEALS BY EMAIL. Please go to http://groups.google.com/group/humanrightsletters
By clicking "Join this group" (at the right) you can become a member of our “Google Group” and will receive sample letters whenever we have them ready.

If you don't see a "Join this group" link, or if you have received an email about “Ready-made human rights letters”, you are already a member.
Under "Discussions" you can see the emails we've previously sent.

GET FRIENDS TO JOIN!

Postage for one sheet (mark envelope AIRMAIL):
from the USA 98¢ (to Canada 75¢, Mexico 79¢)
from Britain 62p (to Europe 56p)

Updates on past cases

You may submit a letter appeal for possible use. Please make it easy for us: Keep it short. Provide a summary of the fuller information (which we like to get in chronological order). Expect to be edited. Provide a web link if possible, or a citation of the authority for the information, e.g. for an Amnesty International Urgent Action, its number, date, and "write no later than" date. Send to guy@universalworkshop.com

Do letters do any good? Mostly they get no apparent response. But they bother the authorities and have been known to play a part in a prisoner's release. Often they cause atrocious conditions to be improved. If known about by a prisoner or other victim, they mightily ENCOURAGE.

“When the first two hundred letters came, the guards gave me back my clothes. Then the next two hundred letters came, and the prison director came to see me. When the next pile of letters arrived, the director got in touch with his superior. The letters kept coming and coming: three thousand of them. The President was informed. The letters still kept arriving, and the President called the prison and told them to let me go.” —Julio de Peña Valdez, trade union leader, after his release in 1974 from underground solitary confinement in the Dominican Republic

These “remhurls” have been sent by email to a list of friends at irregular intervals (monthly, sometimes less, sometimes more) since 1996. Since 2008 we have used this better method of distribution. We are responsible for them; they are not an official production of Amnesty International, Survival International, or any other of our sources.

Another resource for easily sending human-rights letters (it provides individualized texts or printed letters, for small fees per year or other period):
Appeals Worldwide, www.appealsww.com

Universal Workshop home page

Join the team. See yellow box at left.

Jianchazhan
30 Fengming Street
Shuangtaqu
Chaoyangshi 122000
Liaoningsheng
PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA

Dear Procurator,
    I am writing on behalf of Sodmongol. As you may know, he is an activist who was arrested at Beijing airport on his way to a United Nations meeting on Indigenous Peoples in New York. I understand that he is being held incommunicado. His family has not heard from him since April.
    Sodmongol is a prisoner of conscience. I strongly urge you to release him immediately.

information on the case, and some more addresses

Myo Min ZawSenior General Than Shwe
Chairman
State Peace and Development Council
Naypyitaw
Union of Myanmar (Burma)

Dear General,
    I ask you to order the release of Myo Min Zaw.
    He was a student arrested in 1998 for peaceful political activity. He was sentenced to 38 years in prison, later increased to 52!
    I believe that he is now imprisoned at Puta O in Kachin State.
    Many years of his life have been wasted. Please set him free.
    Yours respectfully and sincerely,

The story of Myo Min Zaw

Pa Fue Khang Thao MouaBouasone Bouphavanh, Prime Minister
Prime Minister's Office
Rue Sisavat
Vientiane
Lao People's Democratic Republic

Dear Prime Minister,
    I am concerned about Thao Moua and Pa Fue Khang, ethnic Hmong men now serving sentences of 12 and 15 years in Samkhe Prison.
    They were arrested in June 2003 for working as guides to two foreign journalists. They were shackled, and beaten with sticks and bicycle chains. They had a clearly unfair trial, with no legal representation, and a sentence written beforehand.
    I urge you to:
—Review the cases of Thao Moua and Pa Fue Khang.
—Ensure that they are subjected to no further ill-treatment.
—Release them, if there is no credible evidence of any crime committed by them.
    I look forward to the honor of an early reply from you about this important matter.

The genocide of the Hmong, and another address to which you could send your letter

Hada with his wife and son
Hada with his wife and son

Chairman Ba Te Er
People's Government of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region
Huhhot City
Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region
People's Republic of China

Dear Chairman,
    I ask you to release Hada immediately from Chifeng prison.
    As you know, he is a scholar and bookseller. He has been imprisoned since 1995. His only "crime" was to uphold Mongolian culture.
    I believe he is due for release on December 10. But he is so ill that his wife and son fear he will die if his imprisonment continues.

Information about Hada (we have a lot, we're in touch with a Mongolian group). You could look at the very end for a couple of current points.

Governor of Imo State
Executive Governor's Office
Government House
PMB 1183
Owerri, Imo State
Nigeria

Your Excellency,
    Please have Patrick Okoroafor released immediately.
    Yours respectfully and sincerely,

They pulled out his teeth with pliers

Justice Minister Eisuke Mori
1-1-1 Kasumigaseki
Chiyoda-ku
Tokyo 100-8977
Japan

Dear Minister,
    I appeal to you for Hakamada Iwao.
    He was convicted of murder after an unfair trial. He has spent 40 years (28 of them in solitary confinement) waiting to be hanged, and as a consequence is now mentally ill.
    I urge you to ensure that he is released on account of his age and illness, or at the very least that he receives a new trial meeting international standards.
    I shall be honored to receive your early reply on this shocking matter.

The barbarity of Japan's death row