Amherst Chapter Receives Hironaka Award

The 3-day Annual General Meeting (AGM) of Amnesty International ended last Sun in Virginia. Lot of great things, great people, great Resolutions to strengthen our human rights work.

Our Amherst Chapter (group-128) was recognized when received the prestigious Hironaka Award for community organizing in human rights. I was honored to receive the award on behalf of the members in a special celebration in the main auditorium. I was given the chance twice to share our experience in 2 separate meetings in order to have many other Chapters benefit of the organzing model we excelled over the past 35 years (yes we should celebrate the 35th anniversary this year)

 

One of the highlights of the Conference this year was the powerful speech given by the Ugandan Bishop CHRISTOPHER SENYONJO in support of the LGBT community and their rights to live in peace like all of other people without fear of hate crimes especially in countries like Uganda, Kenya, Sudan.

 

There were many great people at the Conference I met with and managed to strengthen our work relationship with them. This includes Shahram Hashemi, the Chair of the Boards of Directors of Amnesty. I shared with him our concern over few things especially the website and suggested few changes. I had another chance to discuss this in more depth during the Local Groups Training on Fri. 

  All what I can say, there was very clear signs of health recovery within the executive board that we hope to help us to better do our community organizing. I came back with more hope this time!