Amnesty International in Crisis, 1966-7

During 1966, Amnesty International, which had been establishedin 1961 to campaign for the release of ‘prisoners of conscience’,was shaken by a severe internal crisis. It was alleged thatAmnesty had been penetrated by British Intelligence agents,and that it had channelled secret British government fundingto the families of political detainees in Rhodesia. Althoughthe organization survived the crisis, it resulted in the resignationof Amnesty’s founder Peter Benenson as President, andprovoked a re-evaluation of its operational methods. This articleoffers the first detailed account of this episode, drawing onhighly significant new archival and documentary sources.