LONDON, May 28 – Amnesty International on Thursday launched a new campaign focused on helping people "imprisoned by poverty".
The London-based organisation’s chief Irene Khan said after years of helping prisoners of conscience, it was turning its attention to people suffering human rights abuses as a result of poverty.
"Poverty is as much a human rights issue as arbitrary detention," Khan said. "We want to empower people living in poverty so that they can find solutions to their problems."
The "Demand Dignity" campaign has three main aims: to campaign to stop the forced eviction of slums, to promote the voices of women on their sexual and reproductive rights and to promote the rights of indigenous peoples.
Khan said it was a long-term campaign which she will launch next month with a visit to the Kibera slum in Kenya, home to an estimated one million people.
On Thursday, Amnesty also launched its annual report on the state of human rights around the world with a warning that the world is sitting on a "powder keg" of social unrest caused by the global economic slowdown.
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