The tenacity and forthrightness of Amnesty's founding members is truly remarkable and admirable. These were ordinary people with ordinary jobs, who appointed themselves as moonlighting human rights defenders. They picked up their pens and wrote to heads of state, demanding that they release prisoners.

Burma's pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi has touched down in Dublin for a six-hour flying visit to the Irish capital. Slightly behind schedule...

Aslani and thousands of other victims have waited 24 years for this, but now they will finally have their day in court.

The recent meeting between Aung San Suu Kyi and President Thein Sein, the new dictator of Burma, has given many in Burma some hope that there may be a chance of political progress at last.