Amnesty International Ghana warmly commends the President of the Republic of Ghana for granting presidential amnesty to 998 prisoners out of 1,014 recommended by the Prisons Service Council and in consultation with the Council of State.
As I looked up, I could see the back of some of the aluminum roofs from afar, but we still had to cross high grass to get to them. The place seemed isolated from the rest of the town. When we finally reached the entrance of the camp, we met the priest, who was sitting in the shade of large tree, while the women, gathered in a half-circle, were eagerly waiting for us. There were 15 of them, aged between 60 and 90 years old. They were all smiling. When we explained why we were there, they thanked us for taking the time to speak with them. To an outsider’s eye, this seemed to be a small village with a tight-knit community of older women. What was not apparent from the women’s jovial appearances was that their communities, even their families banished them in this remote area for being “witches”.
Amnesty International continues to work on eliminating the death penalty where relevant, and campaigns on individual cases, combating regressive trends and advancing prohibition as a norm of customary international law.
Following the United Nations Security Council’s decision to renew the arms embargo on South Sudan for another year, Amnesty International’s Regional Director for East and Southern Africa, Tigere Chagutah said:
States have laws, policies and practices in place that advance substantive equality and public participation for those otherwise 2 The term “race” should be understood in a broad and inclusive manner, in line with the definition of racial discrimination in international standards. Intersectionality is a recognition that structural discrimination, for example based on sex, gender, race, class, caste, disability or other prohibited grounds, does not operate in isolation; individuals may suffer additional or unique forms of discrimination due to a combination of different forms of discrimination they are subjected to. For more information, see Amnesty International internal document
Our aim is to strengthen the people’s right to freedom of expression and association by 2030, benefitting from expanded civic space, where more people in more places under more circumstances – online and offline – are safely exercising their freedom of expression under the shelter of laws and regulations that protect them from violence, harassment, and unfair treatment.
The 2025 edition of Amnesty International’s annual report, The State of the World’s Human Rights, assesses national, regional and global developments across a wide range of human rights themes. It identifies world trends related to violations in armed conflicts, repression of dissent, discrimination, economic and climate injustice, and the misuse of technology to infringe on human rights. It also highlights how powerful states have deliberately undermined the international rules-based system, hindering the resolution of problems that affect the lives of millions. The report documents human rights concerns during 2024 in 150 countries, connecting global and regional issues and looking to the future.
This report covers the judicial use of the death penalty for the period January to December 2024. Amnesty International’s monitoring shows an increase by 32% in recorded executions compared to 2023. This does not include the thousands of people believed to have been executed in China, as well as in North Korea and Viet Nam, also believed to have resorted to executions extensively. For the second consecutive year, executing countries reached the lowest number on record.
The Ghanaian authorities have failed to protect and fulfil the human rights of hundreds of victims of witchcraft accusations and ritual attacks that forced them to flee their communities fearing for their lives, said Amnesty International in a new report.