Congratulations to Amnesty International for reaching its 50th anniversary.

I first heard of Amnesty in my school days and helped form a local school support group. At that time the head teacher was horrified assuming we’d become some kind of radical revolutionaries and considered expelling us – until the local newspaper printed an article. Phew.

If ever a demonstration of how important Amnesty was to us about free speech that was it. We spend much of the next two years while at school writing Urgent Action airmail letters to central American officials asking for political prisoners to be treated well, information on where they might be if they’d disappeared.

Sadly this work is just as necessary now as then and just as life saving and changing. The world stage feels more unstable without the cold war but it should mean the political dogma of that war doesn’t hold people back from being decent and humane.

Do join Amnesty today and help make the world a better place.

Or alternatively come along to a benefit concert Saturday 16 July 7.30 at St.Stephen’s Church, Sydenham Hill, SE21 7HN – performance by the Astreaeus Ensemble.