NI children feature in new 'Imagine' video

Amnesty International is set to launch a new music video of John Lennon's legendary ballad 'Imagine' featuring children from Northern Ireland.

The song and video will be played on TV music channels across the world this weekend as part of a worldwide human rights education campaign.

The video features children from Largymore Primary School in Lisburn and children from Belfast’s Glen Road as well as India, South Africa, Croatia and Tibet singing the famous song.

Commenting on the campaign, Amnesty International’s Programme Director in Northern Ireland, Patrick Corrigan: “The 'Imagine' campaign is a fantastic opportunity for Amnesty to share our vision of a world where human rights are protected and to ask people to imagine what it will take to ensure that the world really does live as one."

Lennon's widow Yoko Ono has given Amnesty the rights of the song until the end of 2004 at the suggestion of Irish actor Gabriel Byrne.

The Imagine public education campaign was inspired by Byrne after he heard children at a New York school singing it at his niece's graduation ceremony. Ono then agreed to give Amnesty the rights to the song because work of the human rights organisation “embodies the spirit of ‘Imagine’”.

Amnesty International’s Northern Ireland office will be promoting human rights education to every school in the region as part of its campaigning work over the next year.

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