What's the difference between amnesty and pardon?

Amnesty


Definition:

  • (v.) Forgetfulness; cessation of remembrance of wrong; oblivion.
  • (v.) An act of the sovereign power granting oblivion, or a general pardon, for a past offense, as to subjects concerned in an insurrection.
  • (v. t.) To grant amnesty to.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) It is Cruz, a longtime critic of so-called “amnesty” policies, who has spent the greater part of the debate’s aftermath seeking to clarify his position.
  • (2) Amnesty International supports the development of a treaty on business and human rights because we believe states must fulfil their duty to protect people against all human rights abuses, including those caused by corporate abuse and negligence.
  • (3) "If at any time we had been presented with a scheme that in any way amounted to immunity, exemption or amnesty we would have stopped that scheme - consistent with our opposition to the previous Government's Northern Ireland (Offences) Bill in 2005."
  • (4) The Tony Abbott lecturing the American president on taxation fairness is, of course, the one who as Australian prime minister is presiding over policies of taxation amnesty for the richest Australians who have themselves offshored their hidden wealth, capping their taxable liability to merely the last four years.
  • (5) Would Amnesty prefer that no further training was given?
  • (6) We should also have met people who know about the country – Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and in particular the UN special rapporteur, who we could have confronted with our new knowledge,” says Olsen.
  • (7) The report reveals a pattern of frequent Israeli attacks using large aerial bombs to level civilian homes, sometimes killing entire families,” Amnesty said.
  • (8) Hot on the heels of the Beijing Olympics, Shanghai’s 2010 Expo was the biggest in history, spread across an area five times the size of Milan’s exposition at a cost of $50bn (£32bn) – a level of ambition that saw 18,000 families forcibly displaced , according to Amnesty International.
  • (9) According to Amnesty International, the death penalty “is so far removed from any kind of legal parameters that it is almost hard to believe”, with the use of torture to extract confessions commonplace.
  • (10) After his last marathon on Sunday, he will have run more than 2,000 miles, including training, and raised more than £4,000 for Amnesty International and WfWI.
  • (11) Naureen Shah, director of Amnesty International USA’s security and human rights programme, acknowledged the need for governments to assess their approach in the aftermath of major attacks but said: “What we don’t want to see is government using the Paris attacks as a pretext for extending surveillance authorities or pushing back against reforms that even the government acknowledged as necessary.” Some of the hawkish responses to events in Paris “raise a question of whether there’s an exploiting of public fear and anger and anxiety to push legislation through”, she added.
  • (12) After their arrests, the brothers were kept for several months in solitary confinement and later sentenced to prison after what Amnesty International described as a one-day "unfair trial".
  • (13) As a result, the only contact some asylum seekers within the centre have with Amnesty International is through intermittent, non-secure internet access and one to two short phone calls outside the centre each week.
  • (14) He also said tax evaders using Liechtenstein had been offered "amnesty-lite" deals.
  • (15) Najia Bounaim, deputy campaigns director at Amnesty International’s Tunis office, said the arrest was “the latest chilling example of the Egyptian authorities’ systematic persecution of independent human rights defenders.” “We believe she has been arrested for her legitimate human rights work and must be released immediately and unconditionally,” she said.
  • (16) I work with a pacifist organisation; I don’t want to feel like I have to prove to everyone that I am worthy of being a member of this society when I have contributed so much.” Members of Amnesty International attended the peaceful demonstration, which drew little attention from the police.
  • (17) Kieron Bryan, a freelance journalist and one of six Britons among the 30 Greenpeace detainees, said that with all the uncertainty about whether or not they would be included in the amnesty, the past week had been hard to cope with: "We've all been feeling the emotional strain this week," he said from St Petersburg.
  • (18) Last December, Northern Ireland's chief law officer, Attorney General John Larkin QC, said there should be no more police investigations, inquiries or even inquests into killings related to the conflict prior to the 1998 peace deal – an effective amnesty for all Troubles crimes.
  • (19) Margaret Huang, executive director of Amnesty International USA, said: “Chelsea Manning exposed serious abuses, and as a result her own human rights have been violated by the US government for years.
  • (20) However in a statement released in response to the Amnesty International report, corrective services minister Joe Francis said the government makes “no apology for detaining young people who commit violent crimes,” and suggested all Aboriginal young people who are currently in detention are either serving a sentence or are on remand for “extremely serious crimes,” including murder.

Pardon


Definition:

  • (v. t.) The act of pardoning; forgiveness, as of an offender, or of an offense; release from penalty; remission of punishment; absolution.
  • (v. t.) An official warrant of remission of penalty.
  • (v. t.) The state of being forgiven.
  • (v. t.) A release, by a sovereign, or officer having jurisdiction, from the penalties of an offense, being distinguished from amenesty, which is a general obliteration and canceling of a particular line of past offenses.
  • (v. t.) To absolve from the consequences of a fault or the punishment of crime; to free from penalty; -- applied to the offender.
  • (v. t.) To remit the penalty of; to suffer to pass without punishment; to forgive; -- applied to offenses.
  • (v. t.) To refrain from exacting as a penalty.
  • (v. t.) To give leave (of departure) to.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) In an exceptionally rare turn, the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, a panel appointed by the governor that is almost always hardline on executions, recommended that his death sentence be commuted to life in prison because of his mental illness.
  • (2) 'Devastated' Peter Greste calls on Egypt's president to pardon trio Read more “It’s ironic that the conviction was for tarnishing Egypt’s reputation when ... this [case] is what’s tarnished Egypt’s image,” Clooney told BBC News.
  • (3) But Blair's address - "history will forgive us" - was a dubious exercise in group therapy: the cheers smacked of pathetic gratitude, as he piously pardoned the legislators, as well as himself, for the catastrophe of Iraq.
  • (4) A request for a pardon would require an admission of guilt, which the women have said they will not give.
  • (5) I appeal to the king of Saudi Arabia to exercise his power to halt the public flogging by pardoning Mr Badawi, and to urgently review this type of extraordinarily harsh penalty.” Badawi’s case was one of several recent prosecutions of activists.
  • (6) "It is genuinely difficult to understand the motives of the pardons campaign," wrote Cathryn Corns and John Hughes-Wilson in their book, Blindfold and Alone , arguing that there should only be pardons for those who were suffering from shell shock when they left their posts, while other soldiers who "were demonstrably guilty" of desertion "deserved the full rigour of the law by the standards of their time".
  • (7) He looks heavenward in prayer: "Pardon, Richard; they know not what they do."
  • (8) He then tweeted a reference to reports, met with horror among Democrats , that White House advisers were exploring the possibility of presidential pardons.
  • (9) On Thursday, the Russian office of Interpol requested an international search for Mikhail Khodorkovsky , a former oligarch and Putin critic who fled to Switzerland after he was released from prison on a presidential pardon in 2013.
  • (10) In one speech he brought the house down when he introduced his party’s Armenian candidate, Garo Paylan, as “pardon my French”.
  • (11) • US: Offshore clients include Denise Rich, ex-wife of notorious oil trader Marc Rich, who was controversially pardoned by President Clinton on tax evasion charges.
  • (12) The board of pardons and parole had received a letter on behalf of Pope Francis urging them not to allow Gissendaner’s execution, the first since the pope’s address to the US Congress last week in which he called on the United States to abolish the death penalty.
  • (13) While all agree the US President has the complete power to pardon,” Trump wrote , “why think of that when only crime so far is LEAKS against us.FAKE NEWS.” He added: Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) So many people are asking why isn't the A.G. or Special Council looking at the many Hillary Clinton or Comey crimes.
  • (14) This year, we've had the anti-gay riot in the Kenyan town of Mtwapa, the arrest and subsequent pardoning of Steven Monjeza and Tiwonge Chimbalanga in Malawi and, of course, the " gay executions " bill in Uganda.
  • (15) Cameron: Nothing, that's the whole point … Rupert Murdoch: Pardon me for interrupting, sport, but I've just instructed my half-witted son that he is allowed to tell the truth to Leveson, after all.
  • (16) On 20 November Sannikov had to sign an application to Lukashenko for an official pardon.
  • (17) On Tuesday a federal judge in Austin refused Tamayo's request for a restraining order to stop governor Rick Perry and the Texas board of pardons and paroles from considering Tamayo's clemency petition until the procedure is "adequate and fair".
  • (18) "The sale of absolutions was the source of large fortunes to the priests ... God's pardon for crimes already committed, or about to be committed, was advertised according to a graduated tariff.
  • (19) But while Castro, who officially took over from his brother as president in 2008, announced pardons for nearly 3,000 prisoners, those hoping for a loosening of travel rules were disappointed.
  • (20) Glencore was founded by Marc Rich, the controversial oil trader who was accused of tax evasion by American authorities but was pardoned by President Clinton on his last day in office.