Actions and Issues

​Get on the Bus 2020 actions will be listed here when they are announced.

Get on the Bus 2019 featured speakers and actions focused on human rights around the world. Download the letters packet here.
2019 Actions:

​Sri Lanka: Justice for Ragihar Manoharan and the Trinco Five
China/Tibet: Unconditional release of Tibetan activist Tashi Wangchuk and Uyghur economist
​and professor Ilham Tohti
Syria: Stop widespread human rights abuses, including torture, arbitrary detention,
and executions in Syria 
The Philippines: Unconditional release of Senator Leila de Lima
Bahrain: Unconditional release of human rights activist Nabeel Rajab 

Sri Lanka: Justice For Ragihar Manoharan and the Trinco Five 

Ragihar Manoharan, a Sri Lankan Tamil student, and four fellow students had gathered for a chat near the seafront in the town of Trincomalee in northeastern Sri Lanka at about 7:00 p.m. on January 2, 2006, when a grenade was thrown at them from a passing auto rickshaw. The students ran, but at least three of them were injured in the explosion. A short while later, a group of 10 to 15 officers in uniform, believed to be police from the elite Special Task Force, arrived. They reportedly put the injured students into their jeep and beat them with rifle butts, and then pushed them out onto the road. According to a witness, the security forces personnel then shot the five students dead. 

Despite subsequent court hearings and an investigation by a presidential commission of inquiry, no one has been prosecuted for these murders. Ragihar’s father gave evidence at the proceedings and then received death threats. Ultimately, Ragihar’s family was forced to flee Sri Lanka.

Justice for Ragihar and the rest of the Trinco Five has been one of the GOTB actions for several years. In July 2013, due to the mounting international pressure, the Sri Lankan government arrested 12 Police Special Task Force members in connection with the murders. All 12 are out on bail and no further action has been taken since then. We are continuing to call on the Sri Lankan government to effectively investigate and prosecute those who murdered Ragihar Manoharan and the rest of the “Trinco Five."

In January 2018, the Sri Lankan government announced that it would allow evidence to be given by Skype in the Trinco Five case, which would facilitate testimony by witnesses living outside Sri Lanka.  To date, though, little progress has occurred in the case. In fact, both the 2017 and 2018 reports on Sri Lanka from the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights cited the case of the Trinco Five students as an emblematic case of human rights violations for which no appreciable progress has occurred.


Take Action Now: Join the South Asia Regional Action Network
Sign up for monthly actions by email on Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Nepal, India, Pakistan, Bhutan, the Maldives and Bangladesh.

Email jmcdonald@aiusacs.org and write "SARAN sign-up" in the subject line.

Online Resources

Tibet/China: Unconditional release of Tibetan activist Tashi Wangchuk and Uyghur economist
​and professor Ilham Tohti

This year's Get on the Bus will once again call for the immediate and unconditional release of political prisoners being held by the Chinese government. We will have a special focus on two prisoners of conscience: Tibetan language rights activist Tashi Wangchuk and Uyghur scholar Ilham Tohti.

Tashi Wangchuk:

Tashi Wangchuk is a Tibetan entrepreneur and language rights activist. He has been detained by the Chinese government since January 27, 2016 on charges of inciting separatism, after he worked to sue the Chinese government to expand access to Tibetan language education. He faces up to 15 years in prison if he is convicted. 

Coming to the China/Tibet rally? Please print and cut out this mask of Tashi Wangchuk's face. We will be bringing some to the rally, too.

Ilham Tohti:

Ilham Tohti has been held by the Chinese Government for more than five years. He was an economics professor at Central University for Nationalities in Beijing. He has worked for two decades to build understanding between Uighurs and Han Chinese. Rejecting separatism and violence, he tried to reconcile differences between these ethnic groups. Uighurs, a mainly Muslim Turkic ethnic group, have faced widespread discrimination in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region (XUAR) in northwest China.

In January 2014, Ilham Tohti was taken from his home in Beijing by police. For five months, family and friends were not told where he was. He was denied food for 10 days and his feet were shackled for 20 days straight. In September 2014, following an unfair trial, he was sentenced to life imprisonment on charges of separatism. 

Amnesty International recognizes Ilham Tohti as a prisoner of conscience, and continues to call for his immediate and unconditional release. Amnesty also is calling for the release of the many other Uighur scholars and community members who are being unrightfully detained.

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Ilham Tohti
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Tashi Wangchuk. Photo by Gilles Sabrié for The New York Times
          Tashi Wangchuk links:  ​

Syria: Stop widespread human rights abuses, including torture, arbitrary detention,
and executions in Syria 

Ali Mahmoud Othman was disappeared in March 2012. His family was not told where he was being held or why, and no one has heard from Ali Mahmoud Othman since a televised interview on Syria state TV in May 2012.

He was part of a network of activists who ran the makeshift Homs media centre and was also well-known for helping foreign journalists move in and out of Homs. He started reporting on the situation in Syria in the absence of reports by professional journalists, because of restrictions imposed by the Syrian authorities following the outbreak of the Syrian uprising in mid-March 2011.

Amnesty International believes Ali Mahmoud Othman to be a prisoner of conscience detained solely for his peaceful activities as a citizen journalist, and calls on Syrian authorities to immediately and unconditionally release him and to stop widespread human rights abuses, including torture, arbitrary detention, and executions in Syria.
Resources
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Amnesty Research Report, 2017/2018: The State of the World’s Human Rights - Syria

Amnesty News, August 2014: “Disappearances in Syria: The ghosts of the war”

Letter writing action

AIUSA blog post about the dangers journalists in Syria face

AIUSA blog post about ‘enforced disappearances” of journalists

Committee to Protect Journalists: Ali Mahmoud Othman profile
The Philippines: Unconditional release of Senator Leila de Lima
Philippines Senator Leila de Lima has been a vocal critic of the human rights violations that have been committed in the so-called ‘war on drugs’ waged since President Duterte took power in June 2016.

Shortly after President Duterte took office on June 30, 2016, Senator de Lima voiced her concern regarding the increasing number of extrajudicial killings of suspected drug offenders. Following this, the President and other state officials began a campaign of harassment and intimidation against her.

Senator Leila de Lima has been imprisoned since February 24, 2017. Amnesty International believes that the charges against the Senator are politically motivated, and calls on the authorities to immediately and unconditionally release the Senator and drop all charges against her.

​Links:

Bahrain: Unconditional release of human rights activist Nabeel Rajab

Human rights defender/prisoner of conscience Nabeel Rajab currently is serving an unjust 5-year sentence in Bahrain after being imprisoned for sending peaceful tweets.
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