Is there anybody of you readers that knows what a prisoner of conscience is? According to my experience talking to people at town, there are many who are not familiar with that term . Anyway, a prisoner of conscience is a concept that Amnesty International uses to symbolize people that has been imprisoned due to their ethnic heritage, skin colour, religious and political stand points, sex, sexual orientation, faith or opinions. This term often concerns people that haven’t practiced or campaigned for violence in any way. Journalists and people who fights for Human Rights are often those who get imprisoned. You have probably heard of Dawit Isaak.
I hadn’t heard a prisoner of conscience’s story directly until today, even though I daily discuss them they have been rather distant from me I guess. I have only read about what they have been through, never heard their own words. So, it was very powerful to hear Jahangir Alam Akash’s story about how it was to work as a journalist in Bangladesh and how it all ended up.
One of my colleagues met him by a coincidence when she was recruiting new members to Amnesty and it turned out that he had been prisoned in Bangladesh and Amnesty had later helped him and his family to move to Germany. It was inspiring to meet Mr Akash and I think that there are lots to learn from him, but also from other people that never stop fighting for human rights. He said that many journalists in Bangladesh are corrupt and that their salary are often very low, which means that many authorities hand out money to newspapers to publish their news. Akash, however, did not hesitate from being critically towards high-ranking men, and for this he was accused for bribing a entrepreneur.
Akash was not only imprisoned and experienced torture, he was also evicted against his will because of his writings. This lead to that he had to flee his hometown to Dhaka. He said that he is still experiencing back pains from being tortured.
I wish that all people could get knowledge on how badly people are treated in many countries worldwide and that newspapers would write more about human rights issues than people like Anna Anka. If more people would have met Mr Akash I’m sure that they wouldn’t hesitate to take a stand for human right and to become a member of Amnesty International. How many of you are members of Amnesty?
Jahangir Alam Akash
