FiLiA Letter to Amnesty International UK
FiLiA wrote to Amnesty International UK, following the inclusion of FiLiA in their (now withdrawn) report A Growing Threat – the Anti-Rights Movement in the UK – the letter sent is below.
Sent via email to Ms Helen Horton, Chair of Amnesty International UK and Ms Kerry Moscogiuri, CEO of Amnesty International UK on 15th July 2026.
Dear Ms Horton and Ms Moscogiuri,
Re: A Growing Threat – the Anti-Rights Movement in the UK and Like a Snowball: The Growth and Impact of the Gender Critical Movement in the UK
We were alarmed to see FiLiA listed as an ‘anti-rights organisation’ on page 19 of Amnesty International UK’s report A Growing Threat - the Anti-Rights Movement in the UK published on 8th July. We also note you refer to FiLiA in your previous report Like a Snowball: The Growth and Impact of the Gender Critical Movement in the UK on pages 3 and 20. Your opening paragraph of that report describes being gender critical (and by implication, the organisations you have listed) as ‘a movement against the rights of women and LGBTI people’.
In reply, we request you provide evidence alongside the decision-making process which has led Amnesty International UK to identify FiLiA as an ‘anti-rights organisation’ in the above mentioned reports. In addition, we would be keen to meet with you and we ask for your public commitment to cease referring to women's rights organisations and campaigners as ‘anti-rights’.
Defending women’s human rights is central to FiLiA’s mission as an organisation that exists to strengthen the women’s liberation movement. We have charitable status in England, Wales and Scotland for our work promoting women’s human rights, which includes running the largest annual grassroots feminist conference in Europe.
If you were to check our CIO Articles of Association you would be aware that FiLiA is a Human Rights organisation with 3.3 of our Objects being:
To promote human rights [as set out in the Universal Declaration of human rights and subsequent United Nations conventions and declarations] and in particular women's rights throughout the world by all or any of the following means:
obtaining redress for the victims of human rights abuses
research into human rights issues
commenting on proposed human rights legislation
raising awareness of human rights issues
promoting public support for human rights
promoting respect for human rights among individuals and corporations.
As such, you will understand how seriously we take this accusation.
We recognise that our charities hold different positions on a limited number of areas – for example, on the sex trade and on sex-based rights. FiLiA's feminism is rooted in the embodied reality of being female, rather than in gender identity. Disagreements, however strongly held, are not an acceptable reason for demonising FiLiA and other feminist organisations in this way. Our preference, where there are differences, is to create dialogue. As such we are keen to meet with you to discuss our position that sex-based rights are critical for the emancipation of women.
While we appreciate the report listing us as ‘anti-rights’ has now been withdrawn, the impact remains. The response we have seen from Amnesty so far is not sufficient. What is needed now is a commitment from Amnesty that all messaging and conduct which refers to recognising the relevance of biological sex to women's lives and experiences as inherently anti-rights will cease. Your report, Like a Snowball: The Growth and Impact of the Gender Critical Movement in the UK, published in May, remains available online.
It is deeply concerning that Amnesty International UK, such a high-profile, powerful and influential organisation, is targeting and misrepresenting women's rights organisations who do not share your ideological position on sex and gender. There is a profound irony in portraying the advancement of feminism and women's rights from a sex-based perspective as regressive.
It is further concerning that Amnesty has chosen to spend scarce resources in the human rights sector in this way, particularly given the real and active threats to universal human rights. FiLiA is one of a number of organisations working to build solidarity across communities at the grassroots level, amplifying the voices of the most marginalised, including lesbians, migrant women and disabled women, and promoting and defending the Equality Act 2010 and Public Sector Equality Duty. If you accept that women's rights are human rights, then it is highly misguided to consider FiLiA an ‘anti-rights’ organisation, rather than a human rights organisation.
We look forward to receiving the evidence and decision-making process that led to your organisation's decision to make a public statement, in the annex to the, now retracted, report A Growing Threat – the Anti-Rights Movement in the UK, identifying FiLiA as an ‘anti-rights organisation’. Or an explanation, apology and formal retraction of the statement within 14 days.
We also look forward to hearing from you with your available dates for FiLiA’s CEO and Co-chairs to meet Amnesty International UK’s CEO and Chair to begin this much needed dialogue.
Yours sincerely,
Board of Trustees, FiLiA
FiLiA is also a signatory on this joint letter to the Charity Commission, which was coordinated by Sex Matters.