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prisoner or the improvement in prison conditions. In each situation, the circum- stances and imperatives are different, and assessment is both a sensitive and difficult procedure. The Research Department is now attempting to identify the criteria against which initiatives and organizational techniques can realistically be assessed.
The increasing extent and complexity of AI work is well illustrated by the list at the end of this annual report of missions undertaken during the year. It also demonstrates the operational nature of AI research: most missions originate with the responsible researcher, who suggests the appropriate nationality and qualifications for each assignment, writes the brief and may accompany the delegate. Last year delegates representing 18 nationalities carried AI mandates to 31 countries. Trials were attended, inter alia, in Lesotho, Spain, Morocco, Tunis Tunisia, Chile, Yugoslavia, Rhodesia, Namibia and Egypt. Substantive legal inquiries were conducted in Ecuador (into the special tribunals), Northern Ireland (into the Emergency Provisions Act), Sri Lanka (into the Criminal Justice Commissions), and in South Korea (into political trial procedures). All the mission reports made specific recommendations to the governments concerned, and all extended Al's understanding of the legal mechanisms under which political prisoners are tried.
Through the Campaign for the Abolition of Torture, AI national sections and members have acted in response to reports of torture in many countries, particu- larly in Latin America. Appeals against sentence of death have been made for prisoners in, inter alia, Tanzania (Zanzibar), Bulgaria, German Democratic Republic, Zambia, South Korea, Chile, Ethiopia, Iraq, Iran, Somalia, the United States of America and several Caribbean countries, and against arbitrary executions in Equatorial Guinea, Uganda and in many parts of Latin America. Al has protested in the strongest terms against the death of prisoners of con- science in the USSR (from medical neglect) and their murder in Iran.
As AI becomes increasingly recognized internationally as the single source of objective information on political imprisonment, more and more requests for information are made to the Research Department from outside the AI organization. These can present a conflict of priorities. In a single week, a researcher may have to decide whether the preparation of 20 case sheets on prisoners in the Philippines or South Korea is likely to have more immediate effect than the dispatch of a detailed brief to a US Congressman visiting Manila or Seoul to report on human rights violations in the context of continuing American aid. The two approaches are, at best, complementary, and the Research Department has discharged its parallel obligations to inform groups and national sections and to respond to requests for briefs and information from parliamen- tarians, churchmen and other groups in, for example, Holland, the United States or Japan.
The Research Department has been able to meet the needs of the growing AI organization and also respond to outside demands as a result of a farsighted International Executive Committee decision (May 1974) to expand the depart- ment's staff by 25% and thanks to the financial generosity of national sections. At the end of 1974, several highly qualified researchers and assistants were recruited, a number from outside Britain. The 14 present researchers come from
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