Mr. Speaker, Amnesty International is a membership movement dedicated to protecting human rights. It is also independent of any government, political persuasion, or religious creed.
Its main focus is to work for the release of all prisoners of conscience who have not used or advocated violence. This includes people detained anywhere for their beliefs or as a result of their ethnic origin, sex, colour, language, national origin, social origin, economic status, birth or other status.
Amnesty International also works for the fair and prompt trials of all political prisoners, abolition of the death penalty, torture and other cruel treatment and to end extrajudicial executions and disappearances.
As 1998 marks the 50th anniversary of the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, I am sure that all hon. members would like to pay tribute to Amnesty International for its important efforts to promote, defend and protect internationally recognized human rights.