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Anmesty International Annual General Meeting

By Sinzianna Scoarta- A&E and Opinion Editor

The Amnesty International Annual General Meeting was held this year from March 27th -29th  at the Boston Park Plaza Hotel and Towers. The three-day conference had the motto "Seizing the Moment, Building the Movement," reiterating the importance of "international activists working together with others to build the international human rights movement," according to the event program. 

The conference included a rally, plenary sessions, workshops and receptions offering the attendees a wide variety of learning and networking opportunities. On Friday, the attendees, members and non-members took part in the Immigrants' Rights Rally held at Government Center in Boston followed by the Opening Plenary in the evening.  On Saturday, the schedule consisted of plenary sessions on specific topics and workshops. The Focus Plenary was chaired by the Amnesty International Executive Director, Larry Cox, alongside other executive directors and moderated by Gouri Sadhawani, the Deputy Executive Director for Organizing Membership and Campaigns. Larry Cox stressed that, "we can rise above ourselves," and that only, "together we can produce a powerful force." Cox continued by saying, "movements are not built by leaders, they are lead by leaders, but they are built by people," and that Amnesty is, "a movement built on the realization that people can make a difference."

The plenary was followed by program sessions such as "Health care is a Human Right: Realizing the Right to Health in the United States" and "Where There's a Will, There's a Way: Responding to International Human Rights Crises," among others. The program sessions went into detail as far as some Amnesty International campaigns current, past, undergoing, successful or unsuccessful are concerned and featured members and specialists within the organization. In between sessions, attendees could expand their knowledge on Amnesty International campaigns by means of the informational boards posted along the hotel aisles. 

The second morning plenary, "Closing the Door on Guantanamo, Opening the Door to Justice," drew an impressive turnout since the issue is current, recurring and changing following the decisions of the Obama administration. The speakers included Matthew Alexander, a former US military interrogator in Iraq and author of "How to break a terrorist," Scott Horton, human rights attorney and distinguished visiting professor at Hofstra Law School, and Stephen H Olesky, attorney at WilmerHale and co-lead counsel in the case of  "Boumedine vs. Bush." They covered the judicial aspects of the illegally imprisoned detainees in Guantanamo Bay, as well as the human aspect behind the interrogation of suspects in a hands-off manner.

The lunch break provided the students an opportunity to network, while the afternoon workshops provided a hands-on view of Amnesty International. Attendees were able to attend workshops as varied as their level of knowledge and involvement in the organization, such as "Crash Course: Amnesty International and Human Rights," "101 Ideas for Campus Activism: From Facebook to Dorm Blitzes and Beyond," and "Stop Violence Against Women: Mobilizing Grassroots Lobbying Power."

The conference concluded on Sunday with the Closing Plenary and the closing remarks of Larry Cox. The Annual General Meeting represented both a means of having activists further develop their programs and also an opportunity for non-members to become acquainted with the organization. As Larry Cox concluded, "You have to have people that believe not in e-boards, but in themselves, in their power to make a difference."