Ref.: AMR/usa/NAI/516

11 September 1998

Thank you for your letter which was forwarded onto the International Secretariat by AI-UK. Please accept my apology for my tardy reply.

As you may know Amnesty International may only work on cases falling within its very specific mandate which is to seek the release of "prisoners of conscience": persons imprisoned solely for their beliefs, ethnic origin, sex, colour or language, who have not used or advocated violence. There has been much discussion over the years on whether Amnesty can intervene also on grounds of conscience, such as those engaged in civil disobedience who are jailed for refusing to obey court injunctions or who act in civil contempt, etc... The present guidelines, as taken up by the International Council, provide that Al cannot take up such cases unless the law is being used as a pretext to punish individuals for their beliefs rather than for the law violation itself.

Many acts of "civil disobedience" undertaken on conscientious grounds - the type of action pursued by anti-abortionists - involve breaches of laws which do not in themselves breach international human rights standards. In such cases, Amnesty International may only adopt someone as a prisoner of conscience if it finds that the person was imprisoned on account of their beliefs rather than for the law violation itself. This would apply, for example, if the law were used as a pretext to persecute individuals for their beliefs, rather for any recognized legal purpose. This is a standard we apply to all cases of this nature wherever they may occur.

In this case, it appears that Joan Andrews, while clearly motivated by conscience, has been imprisoned under a violation of the law. This case would not, therefore, fall under Amnesty International's mandate unless there was evidence to suggest that the law was being used unfairly or disproportionately to punish the defendant for her beliefs.

I am sorry that we cannot act on your request to adopt Joan Andrews on the basis of the information you have provided.

Yours sincerely,

Nadia Shehadeh
Americas Regional Program