2026 FREEDOM CHALLENGE
You - our rangatahi - are today’s agents of change.
Your voice is powerful.
Your knowledge is powerful.
Your existence is powerful.
We here at Amnesty International Aotearoa New Zealand want to support and equip you in your activism journey, so that you can use your power to seek meaningful change. To raise awareness, to inspire action, and to be beacons of hope.
That’s why we created the annual Freedom Challenge!
Freedom Challenge is a call to action for young people across Aotearoa New Zealand. It is an opportunity for rangatahi to apply their leadership, creativity, and visions for justice by standing together against a pressing human rights issue.
Each year, we launch a campaign that is important and relevant to youth.
We're delighted, for the first time, to be hosting a Pacific-focused Freedom Challenge. Our Pacific leaders and rangatahi are at the fore-front of demanding climate justice. This year we're walking alongside Pacific people. and particularly those in Kiribati, Tuvalu and Aotearoa New Zealand impacted by climate displacement. Together we are demanding their right to live with dignity, whether they choose to live in their island homes or Aotearoa
This year's Freedom Challenge focus is
“Navigating injustice"
which is highlighting the impact of climate displacement in the Pacific and calling on the New Zealand Government to establish a humanitarian visa for Pacific peoples impacted by climate.
Climate change is creating conditions increasingly incompatible with a dignified life. More people are being forced to make a difficult decision – stay and try to live with dignity, or go elsewhere and try to rebuild a life for themselves and their children. But those on the frontlines - including our Pacific neighbours - do not have migration pathways specifically dedicated to people seeking sanctuary from the impacts of climate change and disasters.
See below for resources to help you. Once you have registered, we will also send out physical resources.
Within this Freedom Challenge we urge our government to
- Establish a rights-based humanitarian visa to allow Pacific People most impacted by climate change and disasters to move to, or continue living in, Aotearoa New Zealand
- Scale-up support for mitigation, adaptation and climate finance for loss and damage in the Pacific to ensure that people wanting to stay can do so with dignity.
“Let us remember: One book, one pen, one child, and one teacher can change the world.”
- Malala Yousafzai, Pakistani Education Activist
FREEDOM CHALLENGE: REWIND
You are never too young to take a stand for human rights.
For two decades, rangatahi across the motu have taken up the Freedom Challenge and helped create lasting change.
Below are a handful of wins, amongst many, that prove that when youth like you stand together and take action, we are able to take one (or more!) steps closer to justice.
The action you took in our 2021 “Please take me to a safe place” campaign contributed to the New Zealand’s Government’s 2022 announcement to stop imprisoning people seeking asylum here in Aotearoa New Zealand.
FREEDOM CHALLENGE: PAST THEMES
