Kate Allen (Amnesty International UK)

Katherine Allen (born 25 January 1955) is the Director of Amnesty International UK (AIUK)

Biography

Early career

After studying for a BA(Hons) in Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Brasenose College, University of Oxford, Allen’s career started in local government as a policy officer at the Greater London Council and then Haringey London Borough Council. She was a member of Camden Council during the 1980s where she set up the Women’s Committee

Allen then moved to the Refugee Council, where she headed the UK emergency evacuation programmes for Bosnia and Kosovo, and chaired the Asylum Rights Campaign - a coalition of 100 refugee agencies, lawyers and community organisations - during the passage of major new asylum and immigration legislation.

In 1998/99 she was seconded to the Home Office, where she worked on the 1999 Immigration and Asylum Act.

Amnesty International Career

Allen has led the UK section of the human rights organisation since 2000. AIUK is the second largest Amnesty section worldwide with more than a quarter of a million supporters; the organisation has offices in London, Edinburgh, Belfast and Cardiff. In her time at the organisation she has managed a major restructure and the establishment of the Human Rights Action Centre in Shoreditch.

A regular contributor to broadcast programmes and speaker at public events Allen has comment pieces published regularly in national newspapers and has appeared on the BBC’s "Question Time". In May 2006 she wrote a two-page article in "The Observer" newspaper, which launched an international campaign on Internet censorship and repression [http://observer.guardian.co.uk/amnesty/story/0,,1784718,00.html] .

Allen has travelled around the world for Amnesty on research and lobbying missions. In March 2006, she travelled to Nepal where she met both high level members of the Nepalese army, and commanders of the Maoist rebels to discuss human rights concerns.

Private life

For 18 years she and Ken Livingstone, former leader of the GLC and former Mayor of London, were partners. They split in 2001.

External links

* [http://amnesty.org.uk/ Amnesty International UK]
* [http://www.refugeecouncil.org.uk/ Refugee Council]