20-year old Jabbar Savalan is in prison serving a two-and-a-half year sentence after being convicted on drugs charges trumped up to punish him for his peaceful anti-government activities – using Facebook to call for protests against the Azerbaijani government.

We’ve been campaigning for his release and many of you may have already sent him a birthday card when he turned 20 in September. Tomorrow (18th October) Azerbaijan celebrates its own 20th birthday, of independence from the former Soviet Union, so we’re stepping up with a new action to remind the authorities they can’t deal with peaceful protest through questionable jail sentences.

Send a message to the President of Azerbaijan – @presidentaz on twitter

We know from our Twitter action for Eynulla Fatullayev that we can have an impact in Azerbaijan and our messages will be read.

So we’re starting a global twitter action with several other Amnesty sections today calling for Jabbar Savalan’s release – and strengthening that call by asking the Foreign Office to also raise his case. To join in, just press the ‘tweet’ button below to send your message:

Tweet .@foreignoffice please ask @presidentaz to release #Jabbar Savalan, 20, locked up in #Azerbaijan for a facebook post:

Then please send this tweet to share our twitter action with your contacts:

Tweet Call for the release of #Jabbar Savalan, 20, jailed for using facebook to call for peaceful protest in #Azerbaijan

Don’t have a twitter account?

Why not join Twitter and give our action a go? You’ll also find it’s a great way to keep up-to-date with our campaign work!

Alternatively, you could share the message above on President Aliyev’s public Facebook page. Copy the text and add it as a comment to his latest update.

For more detail on Jabbar’s case, and to keep up to date with new actions in the campaign for his freedom, visit www.amnesty.org.uk/jabbar

Here’s a guest post from our Education and Student team, who’ve been following the Eastlea School youth group for our new film encouraging more young people to get involved with our work. They went to the Foreign & Commonwealth Office on Monday:

When the Eastlea School students sat down with the Minister for human rights, Jeremy Browne MP at the World Day Against The Death Penalty event they discovered they had a lot in common. Jeremy revealed “I enjoyed being involved with Amnesty when I was at school, and it’s clear these students also have huge enthusiasm for human rights campaigning.”

The students told Jeremy Browne more about their work in our campaign to end stoning in Iran, and then it was time for their questions.

They asked what the UK government had done to try to prevent the execution of Troy Davis. The Minister said it had been difficult, as the UK can’t force other countries to do things, but they had tried. He confirmed that the last executioner in Europe, Belarus, is a priority and how abolition in Japan, although a country that only executes a small number of people, would send a strong message to the rest of the world. Finally, he pinpointed countries in the Caribbean as key targets to abolish the death penalty next, as they have it on their books but don’t use it.

All too soon the Minister was whisked away to open the main event, where he spoke about how ‘the more subtle leap’ of enforcing existing standards on the death penalty under international law could reduce the number of global executions more than achieving abolition in a country that rarely uses it. Then it was time for Victoria, Jessica and Khadeeja from Eastlea to take to the stage to introduce the I Talk Out Loud film. The international audience of ambassadors and civil servants showed their support with loud applause before panel chair, Louise De Souza, Head of Human Rights and Democracy Department at the FCO, described it as a ‘hard act to follow’.

“The idealism of the young people is inspirational. I admire their desire to turn ideas into practical outcomes,” concluded the Minister.

The Eastlea group left feeling equally inspired. Khadeeja Shahid, student and youth group member, Eastlea Community School said: “When the Minister told us how good our work was it made me feel that what we’ve done is really worth it. I was surprised to find out that it’s not just Amnesty, people in government are trying to solve human rights problems too.” “It is massively encouraging to have a direct conversation with the UK government and find out that the issue we are campaigning on is also firmly on their agenda,” said Nazanin Shirani, teacher and youth group leader at Eastlea School.

Encouraging news too for schools across the country who are campaigning against the death penalty this month – find out how you can join them!

A girl at the demonstration on Pearl roundabout, Manama, Bahrain, 21 February 2011 © Amnesty International

As protests, uprisings, crackdowns and armed attacks continue across the Middle East and North Africa, we bring you up to date on events from a human rights perspective.

Libya
As the conflict in Libya rages on between Colonel al-Gaddafi’s forces, armed rebels based in Benghazi and international forces attacking from the air, we have issued a Q&A examining the human rights issues at stake.

Our crisis researcher based in Libya, Donatella Rovera, has published a new blog in which she describes how the situation has significantly deteriorated in Benghazi and elsewhere in eastern Libya in the past few days. You can also read our press team’s most recent blogs about Libya.

We have also issued a public statement calling on the Libyan authorities to release four Al Jazeera journalists held incommunicado since they were detained while trying to leave the country two weeks ago.

Hundreds of thousands of people are fleeing violence and persecution in Libya and desperately seeking safety in neighbouring countries. Take action to protect refugees fleeing Libya.

UK arms might have played a role in the brutal crackdown in Libya and elsewhere in the region. Write to the foreign secretary to call for a robust arms trade treaty.

Bahrain
We have urged the Bahraini authorities to ensure the safety of people participating in peaceful protests and of all detainees after allegations of torture by demonstrators.

We have also called for the immediate release of eight prominent Bahraini opposition activists who were arrested following a violent dispersal of demonstrators in Manama. The eight activists, mainly leading members of Shi’a opposition groups prominent in the ongoing protests for reform, were arrested last Thursday in armed raids on their homes. The security forces did not produce arrest warrants and the authorities have not revealed where the detainees have been taken, or allowed them access to lawyers or their families.

Read our report on Bahrain – Bloodied but unbowed, or read our press team’s blog posts about this country.

Egypt
We have issued a statement calling on Egyptian authorities to investigate serious allegations of torture, including forced ‘virginity tests’, inflicted by the army on women protesters arrested in Tahrir Square earlier this month.

Egyptians have strongly backed constitutional changes that will allow the country to move quickly on to elections since the resignation of President Mubarak in February. Official results show that 77% of voters in Saturday’s referendum backed the changes. Pro-democracy activists said the changes did not go far enough.

Yemen
We have called on Yemen to stop its security forces using excessive force as protesters and journalists continue to be attacked at peaceful demonstrations around the country, and targeted in ‘night raids’ and sniper attacks.

Syria
We have called on Syrian authorities to launch an independent investigation into the deaths of at least six anti-government protesters during continuing unrest in the southern city of Dera’a. Protestors were calling for political freedoms, an end to corruption and the release of political prisoners. Scores more have been injured by bullets and tear gas and many more have been detained.

Snow, snow, snow. I know it’s all anybody has talked about all week but I’d like to chip in with Amnesty UK’s own snowy adventure.

As some of you may know, we’ve been getting quite into Twitter of late (along with everyone else and his dog) and have been using our slowly growing network as guinea pigs whilst we trial the idea of offering all of our followers one small way to help, every day. The idea is simple, if we have 1000 plus followers, and each of them has between 10 and 100,000 of their own, when we post an action its potential impact is huge. This is good news for human rights.

Some of the actions we’ve been trying out have been fairly standard. You know the sort; send an email, sign the petition, and so on. Sometimes they’re more about getting the word out and just occasionally we have the chance to do something that is a bit more fun.

So back to the snow.  London ground to a halt and our office was shut. As I started to work from home, all I could think about was the ankle-deep blanket of the stuff sitting just outside my front door. What excuse could I possibly have to play in the snow whilst working? Then it dawned on me. Snowmen for human rights.

I was half-joking when I emailed the rest of the team, but a quick collective approval sent me into action. Having been following the #uksnow tag on Twitter since the previous night, I knew that was my first port of call.

The reaction to the idea was fantastic and within a few hours we were in the top three most re-tweeted posts on Twitter. A first! From there the idea snowballed (excuse the pun), messages were sent on Facebook and members of the team headed out to their local parks to see what they could rustle up.

It wasn’t until the next day, when we made it back into the office, that a few photos began to emerge. After they were uploaded to ProtectTheHuman.com, I excitedly shared them on Twitter.  The Guardian then picked up on the idea and mentioned it in their live snow blog.

This, to me, is a great example of why Amnesty and Twitter can be a great match. It gives us a space to be part of conversations we otherwise wouldn’t be, as well as the chance to engage our supporters in new ways. Whilst this action wasn’t a direct one, the effect was a growth in our network. This means that the next time we have an urgent action; the number of people taking action and sending an email will hopefully increase.

We’re already seeing the effect of this in cases such as that of Larry Ray Swearingen and Bahman Salimian. Both were due to be executed and in the final 24 hours before their execution dates we asked our network on Twitter to send an email calling for them to be halted. The reaction was fantastic and around 400 emails were sent across the two cases with both being granted a last minute stay. Whilst the emails might not have been the deciding factor, they could have been, and as the volume of emails we can send at a moments notice increases, so does the effectiveness of our campaigning.