How did the Urgent Action Network start?
The first Urgent Action was issued on March 19, 1973, following the unwarranted and secret arrest of Luiz Rossi, a professor of economics at the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil. His case eventually reached Amnesty International headquarters in London. Initially, Amnesty researchers developed the Urgent Action technique as a means of acting rapidly when torture and “disappearance” were most likely. Gradually, the focus of the program enlarged, encompassing a variety of cases/situations at risk.
