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Maldives: Judiciary’s Independence Threatened
(Bangkok) – The Maldives government should immediately reinstate three Supreme Court justices who were improperly suspended and cease other efforts to undermine judicial independence, Human Rights Watch said today. The three justices had until April 24, 2025, to respond to a Maldives Judicial Service Commission report recommending their dismissal.
On February 26, the Judicial Service Commission suspended the justices Dr. Azmiralda Zahir, Mahaz Ali Zahir, and Husnu Al Suood, and began disciplinary measures against them. The Supreme Court was preparing to rule on a petition regarding a constitutional amendment that would have stripped lawmakers of their seats if they left or were expelled from the party under which they were elected. The commission submitted its report suspending the justices on April 19 and will hold a hearing to make a final decision regarding dismissal.
“The Maldives judicial commission’s disciplinary actions raise grave concerns about improper interference by President Mohamed Muizzu in the functioning of the Supreme Court,” said Elaine Pearson, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The Maldives cannot be a rights-respecting country so long as the courts are not able to independently rule on critical constitutional issues.”
In March, the justices issued a statement in which they alleged that the attorney general sent agents to threaten the justices with misconduct proceedings before the commission, on which he sits, unless the Supreme Court dismissed the petition concerning the constitutional amendment. During ensuing disciplinary proceedings, counsel for the three justices were not permitted to speak. One of the justices resigned in protest after accusing the president and the attorney general of using intimidation to obtain their dismissal.
Under the 2008 Maldives Constitution, the commission is an independent and impartial institution authorized to investigate complaints about the judiciary, and to take disciplinary action, including dismissal, against them. Article 154 of the constitution states that a judge may be removed from office only if the commission “finds that the person is grossly incompetent, or that the Judge is guilty of gross misconduct.”
The commission has a history of politicization, with successive governments using it to remove judges for political reasons. In 2018, then President Abdulla Yameen ordered the arrest and imprisonment of three justices as part of a broader effort to crush dissent in the country. While governments have pledged reforms, none has carried them out, Human Rights Watch said.
The United Nations Basic Principles on the Independence of the Judiciary states that “[j]udges shall be subject to suspension or removal only for reasons of incapacity or behaviour that renders them unfit to discharge their duties.” Charges brought against a judge “shall be processed expeditiously and fairly under an appropriate procedure. The judge shall have the right to a fair hearing.”
“President Muizzu should take immediate steps to ensure judicial independence and respect for human rights in the Maldives,” Pearson said. “Donors and concerned countries should send the president a clear message to end these threats to the judiciary and the country’s democratic institutions.”
Insurgents in Southern Thailand Kill 16-Year-Old Buddhist Novice
Ethnic Malay Muslim insurgents in southern Thailand shot dead Pongkorn Chumapan, 16, and wounded Pokanit Morasin, 12, on Tuesday when they attacked a pickup truck taking Buddhist monks and novices from Wat Kura temple to collect alms in Songkhla province’s Sabayoi district.
Children have frequently been victims of the separatist conflict in Thailand’s southern border provinces, which has claimed more than 7,000 lives—mostly civilians—since the outbreak of armed insurgency in January 2004.
The attack was carried out by the National Revolutionary Front (Barisan Revolusi Nasional, BRN) separatist movement, which considers Buddhism to be emblematic of the Thai state's occupation of Malay territory. The two boys were ordained as novices during their school break to study Buddhism, a common practice for male students in Thailand to accumulate good karma. At least 23 Buddhist monks and novices have been killed and more than 30 injured during the conflict, most while collecting alms in the morning.
In addition to targeted attacks, children have been victims of indiscriminate shootings and bombings. On Sunday, BRN insurgents detonated a motorcycle bomb outside Khok Khean police station in Narathiwat province, as a pickup truck loaded with students from an evening Quran study passed by. At least seven Muslim children were wounded, with one girl still in critical condition.
These attacks violated international humanitarian law, which provides broad protection for children and other civilians during armed conflict.
There is no justification for the BRN’s attacks targeting civilians, even if the insurgent leadership claims the civilians harmed are part of the Thai Buddhist state or that the BRN’s interpretation of Islam permits such attacks.
Both the BRN and the Thai security forces in Thailand’s deep south have committed numerous serious violations of the laws of war. But violations by one side never justify violations by the other.
Malaysia, which has brokered a peace dialogue between the BRN and Thai authorities, and other concerned governments should not remain silent in the face of unlawful attacks on civilians, which are apparent war crimes. They should press the BRN to cease its deliberate and indiscriminate attacks on civilians and urge Thai authorities to prosecute security forces responsible for abuses committed in southern Thailand. Without progress on the protection of civilians, no one will ever feel safe.
EU: New Law Requires Companies to Tackle Forced Labor
The European Union’s new Forced Labor Regulation will require companies to identify and eliminate forced labor in their operations and supply chains, Human Rights Watch and the Cornell Global Labor Institute (GLI) said today, releasing a question-and-answer document about the new law.
The question-and-answer document provides details and guidance to companies and other stakeholders so that they can begin preparing for the implementation of the EU Regulation, which will prohibit the sale in EU markets of all products linked to forced labor as of December 2027. The document provides an in-depth analysis of the EU Regulation—its mechanisms, potential impact, and key challenges, as well as the expectations of a broad range of stakeholders and the opportunities the regulation presents.
"The EU Forced Labor Regulation can end the economic incentives that allow forced labor to persist by imposing significant financial and reputational risks for companies that fail to prevent abuses,” said Samira Rafaela, visiting fellow at Cornell GLI and former member of the European Parliament and co-rapporteur of the Forced Labor Regulation. “Ultimately, it is a significant step toward meaningful supply chain reform and can ensure that products entering the EU are free from forced labor.”
The EU Regulation, if properly enforced, will prompt companies to eradicate forced labor from their operations and supply chains, Human Rights Watch and GLI said.
The 2022 International Labour Organization (ILO) Global Estimates on Modern Slavery estimated that 17.3 million people are victims of forced labor exploitation in the private sector worldwide, with an 8 percent increase between 2016 and 2021. Another 3.9 million people are victims of state-imposed forced labor in areas such as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in China, in Turkmenistan, and in North Korea. A recent ILO report on the economics of forced labor found that profit of companies from forced labor in the private sector is US$63.9 billion annually.
The EU Regulation sets up rules and processes for the European Commission and national competent authorities to ban products wholly or partially made with forced labor from being sold in the EU. It applies to all companies regardless of size, origin, or location. The regulation sets up two separate investigation processes to address forced labor depending on where it occurs, through national regulators if forced labor happens within an EU member state, or via the European Commission for cases of forced labor outside the EU.
Investigators will take a risk-based approach in deciding which cases to prioritize, focusing on the most important cases in terms of severity and scale, including cases involving state-imposed forced labor. A new EU forced labor risk database will help inform investigators and companies of geographic areas, sectors, and products most at risk of forced labor.
The EU Regulation also provides that a company under investigation can demonstrate its good faith by providing information on their due diligence efforts to tackle forced labor. This should include meaningful and active engagement with suppliers and local stakeholders, including victim groups, civil society, trade unions and independent researchers. Genuine stakeholder engagement is essential for companies to stay informed about risks of forced labor and build on best practices and expertise of actors working in the field, Human Rights Watch and GLI said.
The EU Regulation will complement the EU Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive, adopted in 2024, which requires big companies to set up meaningful due diligence processes throughout their supply chain to identify, prevent, mitigate, and remedy environmental damages and human rights abuses according to a risk-based approach.
Although the recent EU Commission’s Omnibus I proposal is reopening the text of the EU Due Diligence Directive, it remains unclear how deeply key provisions such as liability or scope will be affected. While these changes to the EU Due Diligence Directive would not directly affect the content and purpose of the Forced Labor Regulation, it will create additional uncertainty as to what level of due diligence will be expected from companies.
“Companies will limit the risk of facing Forced Labor Regulation enforcement measures if they demonstrate they have promptly addressed forced labor in their supply chain and provided remedies for victims,” said Hélène de Rengervé, senior EU corporate accountability advocate at Human Rights Watch. “With less than three years to go before the Regulation is fully enforced, companies should start now to set up tools and processes to meaningfully identify and address forced labor in their supply chains.”
New Peru Legislation Threatens Disability Rights
Having a disability should never result in a person being denied freedom. Yet across Latin America, thousands of people with disabilities are still forcibly institutionalized, often from a young age, with little control over their lives. A new amendment to Peru’s General Law on Persons with Disabilities unfortunately exemplifies this problem.
On April 2, 2025, Peru’s Congress added article 29.2 to the law, which states: “The State promotes the creation of specialized care centers and temporary and permanent shelters for persons with disabilities.” The amendment ignores the principles of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), which Peru is a party to.
In the years I’ve spent meeting people with disabilities in institutions across the region, I’ve encountered story after story like Mariana’s. Blind since childhood, Mariana was put in an institution in Brazil at age 12. By 18, she still did not know how to read, write, or use braille due to her limited access to education. Her life was entirely controlled by others.
Institutionalization is one of the most widespread forms of segregation and discrimination against people with disabilities throughout Latin America. Although reliable data is scarce, the patterns are clear. Many people with disabilities in institutions remain there for years—often until death—where their lives are strictly controlled, including when and what to eat, the activities they can engage in, and whom they are allowed to interact with. Many countries continue to publicly fund building or maintaining institutions, believing they are the only viable places for people with disabilities to live.
Peru has actually taken recent steps toward deinstitutionalization through a strategy adopted in February 2025 by its National Council for the Integration of Persons with Disabilities (CONADIS). Though the strategy remains in its early stages, the introduction of article 29.2 this month and its authorization of “specialized care centers and temporary and permanent shelters for persons with disabilities,” permanent residential institutions by different names, achieves the very opposite of deinstitutionalization.
People with disabilities in Peru often enter institutions as children, like Mariana did in Brazil, to leave only when they die, according to CONADIS. Peru’s President Dina Boluarte can and should prevent increased institutionalization by vetoing the new amendment and affirming Peru’s commitment to all peoples’ dignity, autonomy, and the right to be free, including to choose where to live.
US: Trump’s First 100 Days an Assault on Rights
(Washington, DC, April 24, 2025) – The Trump administration’s first 100 days in office have been a relentless barrage of actions that violate, threaten, or undermine the human rights of people in the United States and abroad, Human Rights Watch said today. To illustrate the breadth and depth of the damage done since Donald Trump took office on January 20, 2025, Human Rights Watch released a list of 100 harmful actions during these 100 days.
“In just 100 days, the Trump administration has inflicted enormous damage to human rights in the United States and around the world,” said Tanya Greene, US program director at Human Rights Watch. “We are deeply concerned that these attacks on fundamental freedoms will continue unabated.”
The Human Rights Watch compilation of harm from the first 100 days of the Trump administration includes attacks on free speech; the rights of asylum seekers and immigrants; health, environmental, and social protections; education; foreign aid and humanitarian assistance; and the rule of law.
100 Human Rights Harms in 100 DaysThe Trump Administration’s Assault on Rights in the United States and Abroad
Click here to view the list of human rights harmsSince January, the administration has unlawfully transferred Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national to his home country, deported other immigrants to El Salvador under circumstances that amount to enforced disappearance, and removed asylum seekers with various nationalities to Panama and Costa Rica in violation of international law. The administration has also attacked the rights to freedom of speech and assembly, including by arbitrarily detaining and seeking to deport noncitizens because of their activism related to Palestine.
These damaging policies are reverberating globally as the Trump administration has slashed support for human rights beyond US borders. The administration abruptly ended US foreign aid programs, putting many people who were benefitting from them in life-threatening peril. The administration cut life-saving assistance for hundreds of thousands of people in conflict zones and walked away from longstanding efforts to support human rights defenders, independent journalists, and fact-finding groups, including those documenting unfolding atrocities.
Human Rights Watch is also tracking efforts by the administration that will enable racist practices. The Trump administration is putting new pressure on important work to ensure people have access to the truth about US history and has carried out sharp new attacks on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, which are important tools to promote equality of treatment, enshrined in human rights law and the 14th amendment of the US Constitution.
Many of the administration’s actions are being challenged in court. Ordinary people in the United States and abroad are also expressing their opposition to them.
“Protests across the country point to the critical importance of basic rights and freedoms,” Greene said. “People in the United States and abroad will need to rely on the same fundamental freedoms that are under attack to demonstrate their resistance and resilience.”
US/Panama: Mass Expulsion of Third-Country Nationals
(Washington, DC) – The United States carried out mass expulsions of third-country nationals to Panama between February 12 and 15, 2025, denying them due process and the right to seek asylum, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Both the United States and Panama detained people incommunicado and in harsh conditions.
April 24, 2025 “Nobody Cared, Nobody Listened”The 40-page report “‘Nobody Cared, Nobody Listened:’ The US Expulsion of Third-Country Nationals to Panama” documents this mass expulsion. Human Rights Watch exposes harsh detention conditions and mistreatment migrants experienced in the United States, along with the denial of due process and the right to seek asylum. It also details migrants’ incommunicado detention in Panama, where authorities kept their phones, blocked visitors, and isolated them from the outside world.
“The United States sent people in shackles to a third country without giving them any chance to claim asylum,” said Bill Frelick, refugee and migrant rights director at Human Rights Watch. “Both the US and Panama have a duty to ensure fair asylum processes—no one should be forcibly returned to danger without a full and fair assessment of their refugee claims.”
Human Rights Watch conducted private, in-person interviews with 48 of the 299 third-country nationals—people who are neither citizens of the United States nor Panama—expelled from the United States to Panama. The group included 15 men, 32 women, and one child, originating from Afghanistan, Angola, Cameroon, China, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Iran, Nepal, Pakistan, Russia, Somalia, Sri Lanka, and Uzbekistan.
The people expelled to Panama had all crossed the US border from Mexico since the inauguration of President Donald Trump on January 20, 2025. Many of these people had fled persecution due to ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation, family ties, and political views.
On Inauguration Day, President Trump declared an “invasion” at the US-Mexico border and barred irregular border crossers from seeking asylum, despite US law that affords people at the border and in the United States the right, irrespective of their status, to seek asylum, Human Rights Watch said.
A 27-year-old woman from Iran had fled her country after converting to Christianity fearing arrest and persecution by authorities, as converts face serious human rights violations and can even be sentenced to death. She told Human Rights Watch that she repeatedly asked for asylum once in the United States: “I didn’t understand why they didn’t listen to me. Then an immigration officer told me President Trump had ended asylum, so they were going to deport us.”
All those Human Rights Watch interviewed had intended to seek asylum in the United States and many had gone to great effort to communicate to the US authorities their desire to seek asylum and the fear of return to their home countries. However, none of them were interviewed about the reasons for leaving their countries or asked if they had a credible fear of returning to their countries of origin.
“I may not be a legal immigrant, but the US has a legal system, but I did not see it,” said a woman who had fled China. “Nobody told me anything. They didn’t allow me to say anything.” She said she had fled China because she was “afraid and in pain” from “government control of all aspects of life.”
The US government detained these people in harsh conditions. They were often kept in very cold rooms, prevented from contacting family and lawyers, and either lied to or not told what was happening to them, including when they were handcuffed and shackled, and marched onto military planes bound for Panama.
A 21-year-old woman from Afghanistan fleeing a forced marriage had been detained for 10 days in the United States, when one morning officers came and called off names and made them line up. “When they called my name that morning, I was so happy because I thought they were going to release us,” she said. However, she and others were put on US military planes. They had no idea where they were being flown. People realized they were in Panama only after landing.
In Panama, authorities held them in what amounted to incommunicado detention first at a downtown hotel in Panama City and later at an immigration “reception station” in the Darién province, which borders Colombia. The authorities withheld their phones, prevented them from having visitors, and made other efforts to keep them from contacting the outside world.
They were released in early March, when Panamanian authorities issued them 30-day, extendable up to 90 days, “humanitarian permits” and told them they should use that time to leave the country, either by returning to their home countries or going to some other country. In April, Panamanian authorities extended the permits for another 60 days.
Of the 299 expelled, 180 were later returned to their home countries under the International Organization for Migration’s (IOM) “assisted voluntary return” program; though the conditions of their confinement and the limited options they were given raise serious doubts about whether the returns were voluntary.
A 28-year-old gay man from Russia who fled persecution based on his sexual orientation, said he spoke several times with IOM officials. “I told them that 100 percent I would be arrested if I returned ... But IOM only said, ‘You have no other option but to go to your country …’ They kept ignoring what I was telling them.”
The United States should stop expelling or transferring noncitizens to third countries. It should allow those wrongfully removed to return and seek asylum in line with its international obligations. Most importantly, the United States should stop violating the principle of nonrefoulement—that is, not returning people to a country where they are likely to face harm—by processing asylum claims at its border, rather than outsourcing this responsibility to countries with limited capacity to assess claims or provide protection.
Panama should cease accepting third-country nationals from the United States. If transfers are resumed, they should only occur under a formal agreement that ensures strict adherence to due process and international law, including access to full and fair asylum procedures and respect for the principle of nonrefoulement. Panama needs to guarantee that those it has already agreed to accept can access full and fair asylum procedures.
“However wrongfully these asylum seekers were expelled from the United States and whatever might be done in the future to rectify their mistreatment at the hands of the US government, Panama is now responsible for protecting them,” Frelick said. “That starts with giving them a full and fair hearing on their claims for refugee status.”
COP30 Should Deliver Bold Action on Climate and Rights
Today, Human Rights Watch sent a letter to André Aranha Corrêa do Lago, the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP30) President-designate, and Executive Director Ana Toni, outlining priorities Brazil could champion in the lead-up to and during COP30, which will be hosted in Belém in November 2025.
COP30, the UN’s annual climate conference, arrives at a critical moment. Marking the 10th anniversary of the Paris Agreement, the conference takes place amid an alarming acceleration of the climate crisis. 2024 was the warmest on record and yet COP29, hosted in Azerbaijan, failed to make progress on limiting global warming to below 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels. This makes COP30 a vital opportunity for climate action, and Brazil is in a unique position to realize ambitious outcomes.
In the letter, Human Rights Watch called on the COP30 Presidency to prioritize the phaseout of fossil fuels. Despite COP28’s historic commitment to transition away from fossil fuels, no significant progress was made at COP29. COP30 should move forward with implementing this commitment by incorporating the phaseout of fossil fuels in the agenda of the negotiations. In addition, we urged Brazil to agree principles for a just transition that is rooted in international human rights law, including in particular economic, social, and cultural rights, and the right to development.
On forests, we emphasized the importance of advancing land rights and the full participation of Indigenous peoples and local communities, particularly around decisions made in the context of the Tropical Forest Forever Facility , a new initiative that could play a key role in tackling tropical deforestation.
We also urged Brazil to protect civic space around COP30, to ensure that civil society, activists, and Indigenous peoples can meaningfully engage in the negotiations, by making the upcoming Host Country Agreement public and aligning it with international human rights law. This includes explicit human rights safeguards and protections for freedom of expression, association, and peaceful assembly.
As host of COP30, Brazil has the opportunity to re-center multilateralism and ensure that the global response to climate change is anchored in human rights. By prioritizing the phaseout of fossil fuels, land rights and forest protection, and inclusive civic space, Brazil can help steer the negotiations toward outcomes that match the scale of the climate crisis.
FIFA Has No Child Safeguarding Policy for 2026 World Cup
In two months, the FIFA Club World Cup, an international football tournament for club teams, will kick off in the United States, serving as a testing ground for the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup next year. But FIFA has inexcusably not put a clear and comprehensive child safeguarding framework in place to protect children from harms at these two massive sporting events, which will attract millions of visitors.
Risks that children can face in the context of major sporting events include trafficking, sexual exploitation, child labor, and family displacements, among other forms of violence and abuse. Despite knowing these risks, FIFA has not published a Child Safeguarding policy for the 2026 World Cup: what will probably be the largest and most lucrative sporting event ever.
In 2018, FIFA awarded the US, Canada, and Mexico hosting rights to the 2026 World Cup, in part due to the new requirement for bidding countries to create a Human Rights Strategy. That strategy promised to “develop and implement child safeguarding protocols.” Such a policy should address dangers for kids, gaps in domestic laws, and coordination across sixteen cities in three countries.
Seven years on, these promises have been ignored: and the protection of children who will travel to, attend, watch, and live in the communities hosting does not appear to be a FIFA priority.
FIFA has watered down its promised human rights framework, and there is currently no comprehensive policy in place to protect youth.
A new report, “Keeping the Game Safe,” by the University of Miami School of Law Human Rights Clinic and the Centre for Sport and Human Rights, maps risks to children at mega-sporting events, with concrete recommendations for FIFA and 2026 hosts.
Event organizers should put in place mandatory safeguarding training, binding child protection standards, designate trained and experienced safeguarding officers at each venue and host city, and implement a centralized reporting system. Venues should have child-centered design and stringent protections against child labor.
It is critical for FIFA to establish a uniform child safeguarding policy, applicable to all host cities in the US, Mexico, and Canada. This should take into account socioeconomic and legal contexts, as well as needs of communities and children at risk. Survivor groups and other local and national experts should be engaged in the development of this policy.
The 2026 World Cup needs to raise the bar for children’s rights, not lower it.
Australia: Parties Address Human Rights Issues
(Sydney) – Voters in the upcoming Australian election on May 3, 2025, should consider where political candidates stand on key human rights issues, Human Rights Watch said today. Before casting their ballots, voters should weigh the candidates’ commitments to respecting, protecting and fulfilling human rights within Australia and internationally.
Human Rights Watch on April 4 sent a questionnaire to the three largest political parties in Australian federal elections – the Australian Labor Party, the Liberal National Coalition and the Australian Greens. All three parties responded.
“Australians face a range of issues affecting their human rights, including the cost of living, the climate crisis, refugee intake, and systemic injustices impacting First Nations people, including disproportionate incarceration and the forced separation of families in the child protection system,” said Annabel Hennessy, Australia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The political parties provided Human Rights Watch their positions on these and other human rights issues that voters should consider when voting.”
Serious human rights violations persist in Australia, Human Rights Watch said. These include the government’s obligation to ensure everyone can enjoy their economic, social and cultural rights, such as the rights to food, health, education, and housing without discrimination.
The parties also responded to foreign policy questions that dealt with the International Criminal Court arrest warrants, targeted sanctions against Chinese officials, and the Australian nationals, including women and children, who remain detained in camps and prisons in Northeast Syria.
“With armed conflicts on the rise and foreign governments seeking to dismantle the international human rights framework, Australia’s election comes at a critical moment,” Hennessy said. “Voters should consider how candidates are pledging to respect and fulfill human rights at home and abroad.”
The compilation of responses to the questionnaire can be found on the Human Rights Watch website.
Australia 2025 Election Questionnaire
Below is a question-by-question compilation of responses by the Australian Labor Party (ALP), the Liberal National Coalition and the Australian Greens. The Liberal National Coalition did not respond under each individual question but responded under relevant thematic subheadings. Human Rights Watch has matched their responses to the questions.
Human Rights Legislation
Australia is the only Western democracy without a national human rights act or charter. What is your position on a national Human Rights Act?The Australian Labor Party said “Human rights are to be enjoyed by all. The Albanese Government is committed to protecting the human rights of all Australians. Under Labor, Australia was an original signatory to the Universal Declaration on Human Rights. Labor defends and advances the principles enshrined in the Universal Declaration, both at home and abroad. The Albanese Government notes that Australia’s international obligations have been incorporated into domestic law to the extent necessary to implement Australia’s international human rights obligations. The Albanese Government has no plans to introduce a federal Human Rights Act.”
The Liberal National Coalition said “Australians can be proud of our country’s human rights record. Australia was one of the original signatories to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and has been a vocal advocate for human rights and freedoms, good governance and democratic institutions, particularly in our region. The Coalition has no plans to legislate a Human Rights Act.”
The Australian Greens said “The Greens will use the model Human Rights Act produced by the Parliament’s Human Rights Committee as the basis for a national Human Rights Bill 2025. This will protect essential civil and political rights like the right to life, to a fair trial and to be free from torture as well as the right to a safe environment, to education and social support.”
Children’s Rights
The age of criminal responsibility in most jurisdictions in Australia, including under federal law, is 10 years. The United Nations recommended minimum age of responsibility is 14 years. What is your position on raising the age of responsibility and were you to raise it, what steps would you take to work with states and territories to implement this change?The Australian Labor Party said “Australian state and territory governments have primary responsibility for child protection, justice and detention. Overwhelmingly, age of criminal responsibility reform is a matter for state and territory governments. The Albanese Government remains committed to reform that will enable communities to establish locally tailored initiatives that address the underlying causes of incarceration, including to reduce the contact of First Nations children with the justice system. This includes the establishment of our landmark National Justice Reinvestment Program.”
The Liberal National Coalition said “The Coalition strongly opposes raising the age of criminal responsibility. Commonwealth law only permits convictions for children between the ages of 10 and 14 where the child knows what they are doing is wrong, meaning that under current laws children under 14 can only be convicted where they are capable of being criminally responsible for an offence. The age of criminal responsibility at a state level is a matter for each jurisdiction”.
The Australian Greens said “Locking up children doesn’t solve problems—it creates them. The Greens are working to raise the age of legal responsibility and replace harmful practices with community-based support and culturally safe programs to give young people hope and a brighter future.
We will:
Work with the states and territories to the age of legal responsibility from 10 to 14, ensuring children are no longer criminalised for minor offences.Support young people in their communities by funding culturally safe diversionary programs, mental health services, and community corrections to keep children out of prison and address underlying issues.Develop a roadmap for alternatives to youth detention by investing $50 million over four years in the Attorney General’s Department.”
What actions will you take to incorporate data privacy protections, particularly for children, in Australia’s forthcoming artificial intelligence (AI) regulations so that individuals are protected from the misuse of their personal data in the development and use of AI?
The Australian Labor Party said “The Albanese Government will work to ensure that Australia is a leader in the safe and responsible adoption of AI technologies. The Government will continue to progress its response to the Privacy Act Review, which recognised that children are particularly vulnerable to online harms. This work will build community trust that privacy risks associated with the collection, use and disclosure of personal information, including in the adoption of AI, are being managed appropriately.
The Government’s landmark Privacy and Other Legislation Amendment Act 2024 (Cth) implemented the first tranche of proposals of the Privacy Act Review. The Act included a requirement for the Information Commissioner to develop and register a Children’s Online Privacy Code to better strengthen privacy protections for children. The Act also included measures to provide individuals with greater transparency about the use of their personal information in automated decisions which significantly affect their rights or interests. The Act laid the foundation for further important privacy reform, which will be guided by the Government’s response to the Privacy Act Review.
In this response, the Government agreed in principle to:
Require that the collection, use and disclosure of personal information be fair and reasonable in the circumstances,Prohibit trading in the personal information of a child,Prohibit targeting to a child, with the exception for targeting that is in the child’s best interests, andRequire that privacy settlings for online services should reflect the ‘privacy-by-default’ framework of the Privacy Act.The Government will engage in targeted consultation on the remaining privacy proposals to inform a further tranche of privacy reform.”
The Australian Greens said “AI has enormous potential benefits, but it also has the potential to harm society, the economy, and our personal lives. The Greens are working to ensure that the benefits of AI are shared by all and that risks are managed, including through ensuring robust AI regulation. Our plan includes:
A new Independent AI Regulator and a Digital Rights Commissioner to oversee AI regulation and protect digital rights,Equip regulators such as the eSafety Commissioner with the resources and expertise needed to take down AI generated content which violates the rights of Australians, particularly children,New laws for Facial Recognition and surveillance technologies to protect Australians against the harmful uses of biometric technologies and ensure the protection of Australians’ privacy, andRequire sensitive personal data to be stored within Australia to safeguard against foreign exploitation.”The Liberal National Coalition did not answer this question.
First Nations Peoples’ Rights
Currently, First Nations children in Australia are more than 10 times more likely than non-Indigenous children to be living in out-of-home care (when child protection authorities remove them from their parents and place them in another care setting). What is your plan to end the overrepresentation of First Nations children being removed from their parents by child protection authorities?The Australian Labor Party said “The over-representation of First Nations children and young people in out-of-home care is not acceptable. The reasons for the over-representation are multi-faceted and complex, and include past government policies, discrimination, entrenched disadvantage and intergenerational trauma. Statutory child protection remains a state and territory government responsibility, but the Commonwealth Government has a key role to play in preventing families from coming into contact with child protection. We have established Australia’s first ever National Commissioner for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children and Young People, to protect and promote the rights, interests and wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and young people across a range of issues including the over representation of Indigenous children in out of home care. The Commonwealth Government continues to work closely with First Nations leaders, the non-government sector and state and territory governments to reduce the over representation of First Nations children in out of home care through Safe and Supported: the National Framework for Protecting Australia’s Children 2021-2031, which includes Commonwealth investment of more than $98 million.”
The Liberal National Coalition said: “An elected Dutton Coalition Government will focus on practical action for Indigenous Australians, solutions to improve health outcomes for Indigenous women and children, boost law and order and provide more housing in Indigenous communities. We want to target and address the significant disadvantage and neglect within regional and remote Indigenous communities. We will reintroduce the Cashless Debit Card for working- aged welfare recipients in consultation with communities, to make sure children are getting the support from their parents that they deserve. We will increase opportunities for indigenous children in remote communities to access a quality education, with commonwealth support for boarding school facilities. These facilities play a vital role in building aspiration, as well as keeping teenagers off the streets and out of jail.”
The Australian Greens said “Child protection and removals is one of the ten issues marked as requiring urgent attention in the Australian Greens’ First Nations policy. Article 8.1 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) states that Indigenous people must not be subjected to forced assimilation or destruction of culture, and Outcome 12 in the Closing the Gap Agreement seeks to reduce the rate of over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in out-of-home care by 45% by 2031, from a 2019 baseline of 54.2 per 1,000 First Nations children. To achieve this target, governments must address the lack of cultural competency within mainstream services, the effects of intergenerational trauma, the mistrust of statutory child protection authorities created through decades of destructive policy, and the inadequacy of funding for services that can prevent child removal. Shared decision-making with communities and building the First Nations-led community-controlled sector will be essential. The Greens will provide $113 million in grants for schools to run diversionary programs specifically to get First Nations kids out on country, with Elders, to learn about and connect to culture, language and country as an option to provide holistic healing and growth instead of locking up kids in detention. These programs are to be community led, self-determined, trauma informed and spread across the country in line with the data on First Nations children in institutionalised care.”
First Nations people are grossly overrepresented in Australia’s criminal justice system. Closing The Gap data has shown that the rate of First Nations people in prison has increased by 20 percent since 2019. In 2024, 2,300 First Nations people per 100,000 were incarcerated, compared with a non-Indigenous incarceration rate of 147 per 100,000. What is your plan to end the overrepresentation of First Nations people in Australia’s prisons?
The Australian Labor Party said “First Nations youth incarceration rates across the country are unacceptable. State and territory governments are responsible for the administration of juvenile justice systems. However, the Commonwealth government continues to show leadership on this important issue. The Albanese Government is working with states and territories to reduce the overrepresentation of First Nations children in detention. This includes:
Delivering a landmark National Justice Reinvestment Program,Investing $838 million in Aboriginal Legal Services through the new National Access to Justice Partnership,Working with states and territories through the Standing Council of Attorneys-General on the justice targets under Closing the Gap, andProviding $13.5 million for the U25-GO grant program and $28.3 million for the Youth Empowerment Program to deliver crime prevention, drug diversion, and jobs and skills programs for all youth under the age of 25 at risk of engaging with the criminal justice system.”The Liberal National Coalition said: “We will continue to invest in measures to improve justice and community safety for Indigenous Australians. The former Coalition Government invested $274.5 million from 2021-22 in a number of initiatives including:
Intensive case management services to support Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in youth detention or prison to transition successfully back into their communities and avoid reoffending,Community Night Patrols, which employ Indigenous people to patrol their local communities and offer culturally sensitive assistance and transportation to a safe place for those at risk of harm, andCustody Notification Services, which ensure that every Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander person who is taken into police custody receives a culturally appropriate health and wellbeing check and basic legal information.”The Australian Greens said “The criminal justice system in Australia is a system of entrenched racism where First Nations people are more likely to be stopped by police, more likely to be searched, more likely to be charged and more likely to face serious penalties than their non First Nations counterparts. This has contributed to an epidemic of overrepresentation of First Nations people in prisons in every jurisdiction in Australia. To address this injustice, the Greens will provide $100 million over the forward estimates to implement all the recommendations from the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, in partnership with First Nations people, particularly the families left behind after a death in custody. We will also implement the recommendations from the Australian Law Reform Commission’s Pathway to Justice report on how to end the over-imprisonment of First Nations people, including by establishing a justice reinvestment coordinating body. We will work with affected communities to ensure the recommendations from the Royal Commission into the Detention and Protection of Children in the Northern Territory are also implemented.”
Economic Rights
Research from the Australian Council of Social Services (ACOSS) has found that current social security payments are inadequate to cover the costs of food, housing, and transport in Australia. What is your position on the rate of social security payments? Are they adequate to ensure they meet Australia’s international human rights commitments?The Australia Labor Party said “The Albanese Labor Government is committed to a strong and sustainable social safety net that provides support to those most in need, when they need it. Labor has made significant investments to strengthen the safety net, providing an additional $11.5 billion for social security payments. This includes delivering a $40 per fortnight increase to working age and student payments, including JobSeeker. In recognition that some people can face additional barriers to finding employment and need more support, we also expanded eligibility for the higher rate of Jobseeker to Australians aged 55 and over who are on payment for nine months or more, and to those with an assessed partial capacity to work of 0‑14 hours per week.
Since Labor was elected, the base rate of JobSeeker for single recipients with no dependent children has increased by 22 per cent, which is an extra $3,600 in additional support in people’s pockets each year.
Everyone who receives JobSeeker is eligible for at least one additional supplementary payment which could include the Energy Supplement, Family Tax Benefit and/or Commonwealth Rent Assistance. We’ve delivered the first back-to-back increases to Commonwealth Rent Assistance in over 30 years, to help people on income support, pensioners and low-income families to manage rental pressures. Combined with indexation, this means maximum rates of rent assistance have increased by 45 per cent since Labor was elected.
In addition, for single parents who face the difficult challenge of balancing work and care on their own, the Government has expanded eligibility for Parenting Payment Single until their youngest child turns 14, up from eight.
These measures have been complemented by the comprehensive cost of living relief delivered by Labor to ease pressure on households. This includes a tax cut for every taxpayer, two rounds of relief to help households with their energy bills, cheaper medicines on the PBS, freezing social security deeming rates and record investments to strengthen Medicare to make it cheaper to see a GP and establish more Urgent Care clinics.
Labor will always do what we can to provide support to people who need it. We’ve said we’ll look at payment rates as part of every Budget, and we’ll continue to do that.”
The Liberal National Coalition said “The Coalition believes that it is the government’s role to manage the budget in a prudent and responsible way, to alleviate household cost pressures and restore our standard of living so Australians can get ahead in life. We believe that a strong economy is the key to helping Australians fulfil their aspirations and ensure they can cover the basics in the household budget.
That is why the Coalition's key focus is creating jobs and getting people back into work, because we know that getting a job is the best way to improve the living standards of people and their families.
During the height of the pandemic, when Australians needed it most, the Coalition provided $32 billion in emergency support payments and delivered the largest increase to unemployment benefits for over 30 years. During that period, JobSeeker payment expenditure almost tripled, rising from $9.7 billion in 2018-19 to $27.4 billion in 2020-21.
There are few countries that provide the strong safety net available to Australians. JobSeeker payments are a non-contributory taxpayer funded payment that provides a safety net for people while they look for a job. It is not meant to be a salary or wage replacement. Every dollar spent is a dollar that someone earned, so it is incumbent upon us that spending on our social security safety net is sustainable into the future. Social security payment rates, including JobSeeker, Youth Allowance, Parenting Payment and related working-aged welfare payments, are indexed on a regular basis, which helps to maintain their value over time. Increases to these payment rates are automatically linked to specific price changes, such as the Consumer Price Index and wages.
In addition to base rates of payment, there are more than 20 supplementary payments available to income support recipients, depending on their circumstances and additional needs.
On top of direct payments, our social security system also includes employment services, Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme concessions and health care cards. All of this is funded by taxpayers and therefore needs to be managed responsibly. This responsibility extends to future generations who will have to meet the cost of the social security system in the decades to come.
An elected Dutton Coalition Government will ensure the welfare system is fit for purpose and provides a safety net for those Australians most in need.”
The Australian Greens said “It is clear the rate of social security payments in this country are woefully inadequate and do not meet Australia’s human rights commitments. The increase in income support payments during COVID temporarily lifted hundreds of thousands of people out of poverty, and kept many more from falling into poverty. In a wealthy country like ours, everyone should be able to afford the basics. The Greens have long called for and support income support payments to be lifted above the poverty line.”
The Australian Homelessness Monitor has reported a 22 percent increase of the number of people rough sleeping in the three years to 2023-2024. What is your plan to ensure all Australians’ right to housing is protected and there is adequate availability of public housing?
The Australian Labor Party said “Labor is committed to ensuring all Australians have secure and affordable housing.
We’re delivering 55,000 social and affordable homes, with 28,000 in the construction and planning stages. Through initiatives such as the Housing Australia Future Fund, Labor is helping reduce homelessness and taking pressure off renters.
We’re investing $1.2 billion – nearly 20 times the Coalition over their entire decade in government to support women, children and young people fleeing domestic violence as well as older women at risk of homelessness. These investments are about ensuring that every Australian has the dignity and security of a safe place to call home.
Our Government is providing $9.3 billion over the next five years under the National Agreement on Social Housing and Homelessness (NASHH) with $400 million each year for homelessness services, which the States are required to match.
While many of these homes are being built, we are also providing real relief to renters doing it tough right now, with a 45% increase to Commonwealth Rent Assistance for around 1 million households.
There’s more work to do, but the foundations are in place and are making a huge difference for Australians that are doing it most tough.”
The Liberal National Coalition said “A Dutton Coalition Government will act immediately to fix the housing crisis by boosting the supply of new homes across Australia.
We will deliver $5 billion to fund essential infrastructure like water, power and sewerage at housing development sites to unlock up to 500,000 new homes, with 30 per cent invested in regional communities.
We will reduce migration to sensible levels that our housing supply can handle, as well as implement a two-year ban on foreign investors and temporary residents purchasing existing Australian homes.
The Coalition recognises the challenge of housing for the vulnerable. That's why we established the Affordable Housing Bond Aggregator to provide low-cost finance to registered community housing providers to deliver more social and affordable dwellings. A great achievement of the last Coalition Government was the Home Guarantee Scheme, which has helped over 200,000 Australians purchase their first home.
We expanded this Scheme to single parent families in recognition of the challenges they face, as saving for a deposit is even harder when you are on a single income with children. We also recognise that older women are increasingly at risk of homelessness and housing stress due to lower lifetime incomes, relationship breakdown, and the consequences of family and domestic violence. That's why the Coalition has announced it will extend its new Super Home Buyer Scheme, allowing separated women to access part of their superannuation to put towards a deposit on their own home to help rebuild their lives.”
The Australian Greens said “Australia is experiencing a rental and cost of living crisis. Decades of profit-driven policies have left too many people with skyrocketing rents, substandard housing, and long-term homelessness. The Greens are fighting for transformative solutions that put people first—building and renting homes at prices people can actually afford and making housing a right, not a privilege.
Our plan includes:
A new public property developer to rent and sell homes below market prices, delivering 610,000 new affordable homes in the next decade,Adopting the Housing First model in Australia with $5.2 billion over the first four years for 50,000 ongoing Housing First supportive tenancies nationwide and 40 new supportive accommodation buildings,Double federal funding to states and territories for homelessness services and public and community housing,Make unlimited rent increases illegal, by freezing rents for two years then capping rent increases long term at 2% every 2 years, saving renters thousands each year, andScrap negative gearing and the capital gains tax discount for investors who own more than one property.”
Refugees and Asylum-seekers’ Rights
In January 2025, the UN Human Rights Committee found that Australia is responsible for arbitrary detention of asylum seekers in offshore facilities. What is your position on the offshore processing of asylum seekers?The Australian Labor Party said “The Albanese Labor Government remains completely committed to Operation Sovereign Borders (OSB), of which offshore regional processing is an essential part. There has not been a successful people smuggling venture to Australia in more than a decade. This is due to the policies that underpin OSB and the work of our agencies to enforce them.
The message that you will never settle in Australia if you attempt to travel irregularly by boat is one of the best tools we have available to prevent people being exploited by people smugglers, and making an expensive, dangerous and futile journey towards Australia.
The Albanese Labor Government is committed to upholding Australia’s obligations under the Refugee Convention 1951 and other international human rights treaties to which Australia is a party.
Regional processing countries are responsible for determining how they manage people while their claims are being assessed, including whether they should be in detention.”
The Australian Greens said “Offshore detention is an enormously cruel policy designed to deter and punish people who are seeking a better life in Australia. Nauru and Manus Island have long been places of misery and death, which is a stain on Australia’s national conscience. Prolonged detention - both on and offshore - has a profound effect on a person’s mental health that can lead to self-harm and suicide. Australia should never have started this practice. The Greens will end offshore detention, bringing all persons still in Papua New Guinea or Nauru to Australia and into supported and supervised community accommodation, with the option of permanent settlement.”
The Liberal National Coalition did not respond to this question.
The government has currently set its resettlement places under the Refugee and Humanitarian Program to 20,000 individuals for 2024-2025. Would you increase or decrease this number and to what level?
The Australian Labor Party said “Australia has a long and proud history of providing resettlement for refugees and others who are displaced as a result of conflict, persecution and human rights abuses. With more people displaced worldwide than ever before, we are stepping up to play our part in the global resettlement effort in a responsible way.
The Albanese Labor Government increased the number of places in Australia’s humanitarian program from 13,750 to 20,000 places in 2023-24, and maintained this number of places for the 2024-25 program. In contrast, Peter Dutton and the Liberal Party have committed to cutting the humanitarian program back to 13,750 places if they are elected.
Additionally, more than 20,000 Resolution of Status visas have been issued to former Temporary Protection visa/Safe Haven Enterprise visa holders since the pathway opened in February 2023. People on TPVs/SHEVs arrived before Operation Sovereign Borders, and had been living in limbo in Australia for more than a decade.
These actions demonstrate that by maintaining secure borders, we can deliver a generous, orderly and compassionate humanitarian program while preventing people smuggling and loss of life at sea and without compromising Operation Sovereign Borders.”
The Liberal National Coalition said “Australia is the greatest multicultural nation in the world, something all Australians should be proud of. Since World War II, Australia has resettled more than 950,000 refugees and others with a humanitarian need. A Dutton Coalition Government will reduce the Refugee and Humanitarian intake to its long-term average of 13,750 per year, ensuring Australia remains one of the most generous humanitarian resettlement countries in the world and can respond flexibly to humanitarian crises overseas. We will continue to provide essential support to refugee and humanitarian entrants settling in Australia, in partnership with community organisations, trained volunteers and faith- based groups.”
The Australian Greens said “The Greens will increase Australia’s humanitarian intake from 20,000 to 50,000 per year.”
Australia is one of the world’s biggest exporters of coal and gas. Given the climate crisis, what is your position on phasing out fossil fuels and if you support phasing out fossil fuels, what would your plan be to achieve this?
The Australian Labor Party said “At COP28, Labor was proud to advocate for and secure an agreement committing to transition away from fossil fuels in energy systems, to tripling global renewable energy capacity, and doubling the rate of energy efficiency improvements by 2030.
At COP29, Labor joined 25 countries and the EU in committing to not building new coal power plants. The pledge stands in stark contrast to the Liberal party, who funded a noncompetitive $3.3 million feasibility study into a new coal power plant at Collinsville, which was slammed by the ANAO.
We have expanded the Capacity Investment Scheme to unlock new investment and deliver 32 GW of reliable, affordable renewable electricity to all Australians by 2030. We are backing offshore wind, rooftop solar, batteries and other technologies that the Coalition would stop under their nuclear scheme.”
The Liberal National Coalition said “Our approach is to reduce emissions through technology, not taxes, and in ways that don’t risk regional jobs.
As a general principle, the Coalition acknowledges Australia’s resources sector has been integral to our economy. It accounts for around 12 per cent of Australia’s GDP and more than 60 per cent of Australia’s exports. It directly employs more than 280,000 people and indirectly supports the jobs of some 1.1 million Australians, as well as many communities and businesses across regional Australia.
Resource industry export earnings were $417 billion in 2023-24, helping to support the living standards of all Australians. Taxes and royalties from the industry are providing vital revenues to fund roads, hospitals, schools and other essential services we all rely on.”
The Australian Greens said “The phase out of fossil fuels is the number one task to stop our planet cooking and Australia has an oversized responsibility to contribute because of how much pollution we export to the world. The Greens’ climate targets are for a 75% reduction on 2005 levels by 2030 and for net-zero emissions by 2035, which is what maintaining warming to 1.5 degrees requires.
We have a comprehensive plan to phase out fossil fuels, including:
No new coal, oil and gas project approvals,End subsidies to coal, oil and gas corporations including fossil fuel subsidies in the Budget,Make gas exporters pay taxes and royalties,Planned coal station closure framework,Transition plans for coal and gas workers, andInvestment in clean energy industries of the future to replace fossil fuels.”
Justice and Accountability
Do you support Australia being a member of the International Criminal Court (ICC)? Should Australia enforce ICC arrest warrants for active heads of state?The Australian Labor Party said “Australia has been a longstanding supporter of the International Criminal Court (ICC). Under the Albanese Labor Government, that position has not changed. We continue to reiterate our respect for the Court, its independence and its important role in upholding international law. Australia will act consistently with its international obligations. The Albanese Labor Government’s approach will be informed by international law, not politics. We are not contemplating and would not contemplate withdrawing from the ICC.”
The Liberal National Coalition said “Australia signed the Rome Statue establishing the International Criminal Court in 1998 under the Howard Coalition Government to enhance international peace and security. The Coalition is committed to universal human rights, including the rule of law, individual freedom and the right to dignity and respect.”
The Australian Greens said “The Greens support Australia remaining a member of the International Criminal Court. As signatories to the Rome Statute, Australia has an obligation to enforce all ICC arrest warrants including those for active heads of state and the Greens believe that Australia should uphold that obligation.”
In 2024, the Australian government used its thematic human rights or corruption sanctions on entities or individuals in Iran, Russia, and Israel. Other sanctions were also placed individuals and entities in Myanmar and affiliates of Hamas in Palestine. Should Australia impose targeted sanctions against Chinese officials or companies for severe human rights abuses, including crimes against humanity against Uyghurs?
The Australian Labor Party said “The Albanese Labor Government’s support for human rights and values is central to who we are and how we seek to shape the world. We deploy every strategy at our disposal towards upholding human rights – ranging from dialogue and diplomacy to sanctions – consistent with our values and our interests. Sanctions are an essential foreign policy tool. But they are not the only way – nor necessarily the most effective way – to push for change.
The Albanese Labor Government takes every opportunity to convey our concerns to China about human rights situations, including in Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong. Our resumption of dialogue with China has enabled us to consistently raise our deep concerns at the highest levels, as Prime Minister Albanese and Foreign Minister Wong have done.
We also raise our concerns publicly, and partner with other countries to advocate and build coalitions for the protection of human rights. In October 2024, Australia led, for the first time, a joint statement at the Human Rights Council with 14 partners, drawing on the credible and objective findings of independent United Nations experts about the human rights situation in China. Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs Tim Watts also raised China’s human rights violations against Uyghurs and other minorities in Xinjiang in Australia’s high-level statement to the 58th session of the Human Rights Council on 27 February.
Unlike predecessors, the Foreign Minister has regularly engaged with Hong Kong, Uyghur and Tibetan communities in Australia, as well as the advocates from civil society organisations and across the parliament. We are committed to having their voices heard in bilateral and multilateral forums.”
The Liberal National Coalition said “We have consistently voiced our concerns about human rights violations, including in Tibet, Xinjiang and Hong Kong. Under the former Coalition Government, Australia was one of 45 countries to join a statement on human rights in China at the UN Human Rights Council. Australian officials regularly raised our concerns about the treatment of Tibetans with Chinese officials in Canberra and Beijing, particularly the detention of Tibetans for the peaceful expression of political views, restrictions on travel and China’s policies on Tibetan cultural rights and heritage.
The Coalition has repeatedly called on the Labor Government to use the Magnitsky-style sanctions at their disposal to respond to human rights abuses against Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang region.
We strongly supported the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights’ calls for the prompt release of all individuals arbitrarily deprived of their liberty and an urgent independent investigation into allegations of human rights abuse.
We are disappointed that the Labor government has not taken up our offer of bipartisanship.”
The Australian Greens said “The Greens have consistently called for application of targeted sanctions on Chinese officials or companies responsible for severe human rights abuses, including those committed against Uyghurs or Tibetans.”
A few dozen Australian nationals, including women and children, remain detained in camps and prisons in Northeast Syria as Islamic State (ISIS) suspects or their family members. What response do you intend to take to address this situation and what is your position on creating a pathway for their return and rehabilitation or as appropriate criminal investigations?
The Australian Labor Party said “Decisions relating to repatriations of Australia-linked women and children located in internally displace persons (IDP) camps in northeast Syria are made on the basis of a range of security, diplomatic, community and welfare factors. The government’s overriding priority is the protection of Australians and Australia’s national interest, informed by national security advice.
The government acknowledges the humanitarian and welfare issues affecting those in IDP camps. We are partnering with international humanitarian organisations who have access to the camps and the mandate and expertise to deliver assistance. Australia has provided more than half a billion dollars to the Syrian regional response since 2011, including a further $30 million to address urgent humanitarian needs announced in March this year.”
The Australian Greens said “The Greens are supportive of creating a pathway for the return of Australian nationals currently imprisoned in prison camps in North East Syria, as well as rehabilitation of these individuals following a human-rights compliant process to ensure they are innocent of any criminal activity. We are proud to have campaigned alongside HRW and many other organisations on this issue - particularly in relation to children.”
The Liberal National Coalition did not respond to this question.
Throughout the Asia-Pacific region, governments from Vietnam to India have suppressed human rights defenders, journalists, and bloggers. What steps should Australia take to promote the rights to freedom of expression, media freedom, and freedom of association throughout the region?
The Australian Labor Party said “The Albanese Labor Government is committed to protecting, promoting and advancing universal human rights, including to advocate for media freedom and the protection of journalists and human rights defenders. As active members of the Media Freedom Coalition and the Freedom Online Coalition, we work to promote freedom of expression and call out censorship and suppression globally.
Since coming to office in 2022, we have worked tirelessly to rebuild relationships in the Indo-Pacific that enable us to speak directly and respectfully about important issues, including where we disagree, while we advance our shared interests. We are clear about values and support for freedom of expression, and have regular and open dialogue to convey our concerns about human rights at senior levels.
This includes through regular bilateral human rights dialogues, which enables us to have frank and constructive discussions on human rights concerns. We also cooperate with partners to advance the protection of human rights in the Indo-Pacific, including by delivering support through our development program to strengthen national human rights, including in partnership with the Australian Human Rights Commission.
We engage actively at the United Nations, including the Human Rights Council, to support the international human rights system that is essential for encouraging progress in the Indo-Pacific.
We make recommendations to every Indo-Pacific member of the Human Rights Council at their Universal Periodic Review.”
The Liberal National Coalition said “Australia’s democracy and way of life is underpinned by robust, independent media and a commitment to freedom of speech and association.
Under the Coalition, Australia advocated for a free and independent media, with protections in place to ensure the safety of journalists.
A Dutton Coalition Government will continue to ensure individual rights and freedoms, including freedom of speech, are protected.”
The Australian Greens said “The Greens believe that Australia must act diplomatically to promote human rights, including the right to freedom of opinion, expression and association. The Australian Government should use its relationships with nations in the Asia-Pacific to promote free speech and hold perpetrators of suppression to account.”
15. How can Australia best promote human rights in Asia and the Pacific?
The Australian Labor Party said “The Albanese Labor Government deals with the world as it is and seeks to shape it for the better. We seek to protect human rights in a world in which human rights abuses are too prevalent, and in which many countries do not share our values.
We are deeply concerned about human rights abuses in our region and around the world. In 2022, the Albanese Labor Government appointed Australia’s first Ambassador for Human Rights, to elevate Australia’s profile and leadership on human rights internationally, including in our region, and to bolster Australia’s efforts to strengthen and uphold the United Nations human rights architecture and international law.
The Human Rights Ambassador works alongside Australia’s Ambassador for Gender Equality, who leads international advocacy, public diplomacy and outreach on gender equality and the human rights of women and girls, in support of the key priorities in Australia’s International Gender Equality Strategy.
We support a broad range of other initiatives to advance human rights in our region, including strengthening regional justice and policing systems, and safeguarding a vibrant and independent media sector. We also work to foster robust civil society and address shrinking civic space, including through our $35 million Civil Society Partnerships Fund.
The Albanese Labor Government works closely with our Pacific partners to safeguard human rights in our region. The 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent (2050 Strategy) was endorsed by Pacific Leaders, including Australia, in 2022. Human rights are a core component of the People-Centred Development pillar of the 2050 Strategy, which seeks to address issues of exclusion and inequality of gender and marginalised groups, and protect human and environmental rights.
The Albanese Labor Government appointed Australia’s inaugural First Nations Ambassador to embed First Nations perspectives into Australia’s foreign policy and advance Indigenous Peoples’ rights internationally, including with the Pacific. The close cultural connections between Australia’s First Nations Peoples with the Pacific make this a powerful mechanism for discussing human rights issues for the region’s Indigenous Peoples and advance collective action internationally.”
The Australian Greens said “The Greens have consistently called on the Australian government to promote human rights in the Asia-Pacific by ending AUKUS, applying targeted sanctions on human rights abusers, and raising human rights concerns in international forums.”
The Liberal National Coalition did not respond to this question.
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The Liberal National Coalition did not respond under each individual question but responded under relevant thematic subheadings. See here.
Lebanon: Indiscriminate Israeli Attacks on Civilians
(Beirut) – Two unlawful Israeli strikes on the northeastern Lebanese town of Younine between September and November 2024, which killed 33 civilians, 15 of them children, were apparent indiscriminate attacks on civilians, Human Rights Watch said today.
At least one of the attacks used an air-dropped bomb equipped with a United States-produced Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) guidance kit. The attacks should be investigated as war crimes.
“More and more evidence is emerging that Israeli forces repeatedly failed to protect civilians or adequately distinguish civilians from military targets during its strikes across Lebanon in 2023 and 2024,” said Ramzi Kaiss, Lebanon researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Lebanon’s government should provide a path for justice for grieving families, including by giving the International Criminal Court jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute crimes.”
In May 2024, Lebanon’s former government reversed a decision which it had issued a month earlier to give the International Criminal Court (ICC) jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute serious crimes committed on Lebanese territory since October 7, 2023. Lebanon’s new government should urgently accept ICC jurisdiction to give the court’s prosecutor a mandate to investigate serious international crimes committed on the country’s territory.
One attack, on September 25, killed a family of 23 people, all Syrians, including 13 children. On November 1, a strike on a two-story house killed 10 people, including 2 children, one of them a year old, 5 women, and 3 men. Human Rights Watch did not find any evidence of military activity or targets at either site.
Human Rights Watch investigated a third strike in Younine that occurred on November 21, which killed a family of four adults.Researchers found several Hezbollah “martyr” posters online and in Younine for one of the male victims, but were unable to verify who made the posters, and reviewed photos of his grave indicating that he may have been a Hezbollah combatant.
Between November 2024 and February 2025, Human Rights Watch researchers visited the sites of the two strikes in Younine, near Baalbeck, in eastern Lebanon. Human Rights Watch researchers also visited the cemetery in Younine and inspected the burial sites of people from the village killed in Israeli attacks, including combatants and civilians. Human Rights Watch reviewed photos and videos shared on social media in the aftermath of the strikes.
Human Rights Watch interviewed 10 people, some in person, at strike sites in Younine, and others via telephone. Weapon remnants found at the sites of the September 25 and November 21 strikes and reviewed by Human Rights Watch arms researchers indicate the Israeli military’s use of a Mk-80 series general purpose air-dropped bomb equipped with a US-made JDAM kit. Weapon remnants found at the site of the November 1 strike also indicate the Israeli military’s use of a Mk-80 series general purpose bomb.
The Israeli military did not warn civilians to evacuate before either strike, residents told Human Rights Watch. Human Rights Watch verified this claim by reviewing social media posts by the Israeli Arabic language spokesperson and the Israeli military’s Arabic language telegram channels, where evacuation warnings are typically shared. Human Rights Watch sent a letter outlining its findings and posing questions to the Israeli military on March 24 but has not received a response.
Under international humanitarian law, all parties to the conflict are obligated, at all times, to distinguish between combatants and civilians and to direct attacks only against combatants or other military objectives. Individuals who commit serious violations of the laws of war with criminal intent – that is, intentionally or recklessly – may be prosecuted for war crimes. Individuals may also be held criminally liable for assisting in, facilitating, aiding, or abetting a war crime. All governments that are parties to an armed conflict are obligated to investigate alleged war crimes by members of their armed forces.
When carrying out any attack, warring parties must take all feasible precautions to minimize civilian harm and damage to civilian objects. This includes taking all necessary actions to verify that targets are military objectives.
Between October 2023 and December 2024, Israeli attacks in Lebanon killed more than 4,000 people and displaced over one million. Since the November 27 ceasefire deal between Israel and Hezbollah came into effect, Israeli attacks have reportedly killed at least 146 people in Lebanon, including at least 26 who were attempting to return to villages where Israeli forces had not yet withdrawn. As of March 20, nearly 100,000 people remained displaced in the country from the recent conflict, according to the United Nations International Organization for Migration (IOM).
Lebanon and other United Nations member states should establish an international investigation into all human rights violations committed by all parties involved in the conflict in Lebanon. Such an investigation could document ongoing crimes, collect evidence, and publicly report on their findings. Lebanon’s government could also further its cooperation with the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and ongoing investigations into Israeli attacks in Lebanon to ensure accurate documentation of unlawful attacks, including war crimes committed between October 2023 and December 2024.
The United States government’s provision of arms to Israel, which have repeatedly been used to carry out apparent war crimes, has made the US complicit in their unlawful use. Human Rights Watch has previously documented the unlawful use of US weapons in and unlawful attack on aid workers and an apparently deliberate attack on journalists in Lebanon.
Providing military assistance to Israel violates US law, which prohibits arms transfers to “any country the government of which engages in a consistent pattern of gross violations internationally recognized human rights.” All states, including Israel’s key allies such as the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Germany should suspend military assistance and arms sales to Israel.
Lebanon’s parliament should also ratify the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, Human Rights Watch said.
“Countries still supplying Israel with arms, including primarily the United States, need to wake up to the reality that their continued military support, despite ample evidence of unlawful attacks, has made them complicit in the unlawful killing of civilians,” Kaiss said. “Victims have a right to justice and reparations, and those responsible should be held to account.”
September 25 Israeli AirstrikeAfter 10 p.m. on September 25, an Israeli airstrike struck a residential building along the main Baalbek-Qaa highway near the road junction that leads into the center of the town of Younine, killing 22 members of one extended Syrian family, including 13 children. Another family member died eight days later in a Damascus hospital as a result of his injuries. Seven people survived the attack, including three Lebanese men, six of them with various injuries.
Click to expand Image Destruction from an Israeli airstrike on September 25, 2024, that struck a residential building along the main Baalbek-Qaa highway near the road junction that leads into the center of the town of Younine, Lebanon. © 2024 Human Rights WatchHuman Rights Watch interviewed multiple sources about the incident, including four survivors, the building’s owner, who is also the mother of one survivor, a local supermarket owner who was among the first to arrive at the scene, the mayor of Younine, a relative of the family who lives in Idlib, Syria, and a Lebanese researcher familiar with the town.
Researchers verified photos and videos of the immediate aftermath, the burial of the victims two days later, and satellite imagery. They cross-referenced a list of casualties provided by the family’s relative in Idlib with Younine’s mayor and two survivors. Researchers conducted open-source research into the names of both victims and survivors, to establish if any of them may have been or are combatants, and cross-referenced findings with open-source material shared by Airwars, a nongovernmental organization that investigates civilian harm in conflict zones. During a December 2 visit to the site, researchers viewed remnants of a bomb equipped with a United States-produced JDAM guidance kit found in the rubble.
Witnesses said that the two-story building contained two apartments on the ground floor, both rented to Syrians. The family living in the other ground floor apartment was not present at the time of the attack. Two other buildings sharing the same owner are attached to the building, one of which housed the three other branches of the Abdelkader family, and another that housed the owner and five of her other children, who had fled the building soon after Israel intensified its aerial campaign on Lebanon in September 2024. The buildings also housed a physical therapy center, a mobile phone shop, and a shuttered gas station that had been out of operation for over a year.
Destruction from an Israeli airstrike on September 25, 2024, in Younine, Lebanon. © 2024 Human Rights Watch Damage to a residential building after an Israeli airstrike on September 25, 2024, Younine, Lebanon. © 2024 Human Rights Watch Youssef standing in what is left of a residential building after an Israeli airstrike on September 25, 2024, Younine, Lebanon. © 2024 Human Rights Watch“My uncle’s family who lived in that building, they were planning to leave to Syria the next morning so we were all gathered there to say goodbye,” said Yousef Abdelkader, 16, who alongside his brother Mohammad, 17, and their cousin, 15-year-old Hassan, were the only survivors from the Abdelkader family in the building at the time of the attack. The attack killed their parents, siblings, grandfather, and two uncles’ families.
“Just before the strike, I left the apartment ahead of the rest of my family to return to my family’s apartment in one of the attached buildings. My mom, grandpa, and others were still standing just outside the door talking to the rest of the family when I heard the sound of a plane, and I saw the rocket fall,” said Yousef.
Other survivors were a distant relative who also lived in Younine, the building owner’s son, who lived on the second floor, and two Lebanese neighbors. Waleed Rbeidi, the relative, said: “[When the bomb struck], I was on the ground-floor veranda with some other men from the neighborhood, friends of mine, who had called over to me to have coffee with them.”
Rbeidi and another survivor both said that they received no warning ahead of the attack. “We just heard the sound of the rocket and suddenly the house fell over their heads,” he said, telling researchers that doctors had to later remove several pieces of shrapnel from his body.
“There was no warning,” said the building owner’s son. “The munition came straight down on us. Each of us [standing in the veranda] flew in a different direction.”
Another Lebanese survivor, who lives on the same street and owns a shop nearby, described the moments leading up to the attack: “We were all staying up late together that night. For a couple of hours before the strike, I remember we didn’t hear any drones, it was quiet. All I remember from the strike is hearing a loud noise and then I lost consciousness. I spent 20 days in the hospital with shrapnel in my leg, arm, and neck.”
The Israeli military did not comment directly on the strike, but it posted on X and Telegram the next morning that its forces had struck approximately 75 Hezbollah targets in the Bekaa area and in southern Lebanon overnight, including “weapons storage facilities, ready-to-fire launchers, terrorists, and terrorist infrastructure.”
Younine’s mayor, Ali Kassas, said that two other airstrikes had targeted the town earlier that day. Human Rights Watch found no evidence of a military target in the immediate area of the September 25 strike and all those interviewed insisted there were no fighters or military equipment in the building or the neighborhood. “We are still trying to make sense of the strike, to find a reason for it,” Kassas said. “We still can’t understand why they would target a building full of Syrians. They’re not even Lebanese. The entire intersection is mostly Syrians, many […] camps around and most buildings rented to Syrians.”
Kassas described the rescue efforts: “We headed to the location immediately after we learned of the strike, ambulances too, and we pulled bodies from under the rubble. On the first day we pulled 19, we didn’t even know how many people were in the building to begin with or who they were. There was a boy who was a relative of some of the dead and he helped us identify them and said that there were others missing, including his uncle and aunt. The second day we went back and pulled out three more.”
“After the strike, dead bodies were strewn across the ground,” said Yousef, who helped rescuers identify his family members who were killed. “It was really hard for me to identify them because some of them were in pieces.”
November 1 StrikeAt around 2 p.m. on November 1, an Israeli strike on the al-Salah neighborhood in Younine destroyed a two-story building.
Human Rights Watch researchers visited the site on December 2, 2024, and February 12, 2025, and interviewed Ali Salah, who lost 10 family members in the strike. Salah lived in the same neighborhood and was in the vicinity at the time of the attack. On February 12, Human Rights Watch also spoke to another neighbor and relative of the Salah family who lived in the same neighborhood and spoke with the mayor of Younine about the strike on March 21.
The remnants of a destroyed a two-story building after an Israeli strike on November 1, 2024, in the al-Salah neighborhood in Younine, Lebanon. © 2024 Human Rights Watch The damage caused to nearby houses and vehicles after an Israeli airstrike on a two-story building on November 1, 2024, in the al-Salah neighborhood in Younine, Lebanon. © 2024 Human Rights WatchAli Salah said that those killed in the strike included his two sisters, Wadha, born 1959, and Fairouz, born 1975; his brothers-in-law:, Haidar Mahdi Salah, who worked as a painter and owned a supermarket, and Mohammad Mahdi Salah, who worked as a taxi driver; his nieces, Elissar, 27, and Zeina, 17; his nephew Ali Haidar Salah, 30, and Ali’s family, including his wife, Nour Boudaq, his son, Haidar, a year old, and his mother-in-law, Um Bachir Boudaq.
“Haidar [Mahdi Salah] works as a painter, and Mohammed works as Taxi driver,” Ali Kassas, the mayor, told Human Rights Watch. “Ali Haidar works with his dad as a painter, and the rest were children and women. Haidar [Ali Salah] was just one year old […] None of the people killed were combatants. They’re not even connected to any party.”
The strike came shortly after Mohammed Mahdi Salah returned home after finishing his shift as a taxi driver, Ali Salah said.
“Mohammed makes about LBP50,000 [around US$0.55] for a ride in the Bekaa,” he said. “All our family, the Salah family, we don’t have a single person in Hezbollah. Not a single person. Ask whoever you want.”
“There’s no one I value more than my sisters. If I thought there was any reason for there to be a military target here, I would have forced them to leave. There was nothing here. Just civilians.”
Click to expand Image Weapon remnants found at the site where a two-story building was destroyed by an Israeli airstrike on November 1, 2024, in the al-Salah neighborhood in Younine, Lebanon. © 2024 Human Rights WatchThe Israeli military did not comment directly about this strike. However, a post shared on the Israeli armed forces’ telegram page on November 2, one day after the strike, stated that “over the past day, the [Israeli Air Force] struck more than 120 terror targets belonging to both Hamas and Hezbollah. These included anti-tank missile launching sites, terrorist operatives, terror infrastructure sites, weapons storage facilities, and command centers in Lebanon.”
Human Rights Watch conducted open-source research on the strike, including into the names of those killed, to determine if they were combatants. Researchers did not find any evidence indicating the presence of combatants or a military objective at the site of the strike. All individuals interviewed said that no evacuation warning was given to residents prior to the strike.
A banner outside the cemetery in Younine, which Human Rights Watch researchers visited, displayed the names and photos of people from Younine who were killed in Israeli attacks, including civilians and individuals who appear to be combatants. Photos of the male victims of the November 1 attack – including Mohmmad Mahdi Salah, Haidar Mahdi Salah, and Ali Haidar Salah – showed them in civilian clothing and appear to be designated as civilians below the photographs of apparent combatants. The names of women killed in the strike were displayed without photos. None of the individuals killed in the November 1 attack were buried in an area within the cemetery that appeared to be reserved for Hezbollah fighters.
Ali Salih described his anguish over the death of his family members. “Um Bachir [Salih’s mother-in-law] wanted to go to Ghobeiry, in Dahyeh [Beirut’s southern suburb], and I would tell her, ‘If I tell you to leave and you get killed, I will feel very guilty; If you stay and get killed, I’ll also feel very guilty. So do as you want.’”
Kassas, the mayor, who arrived at the site of the strike shortly after the attack, described horrific scenes: “The scene at the strike made our hearts cry. Some bodies did not have heads attached to them. Other bodies were flattened by the strike. One person, we just knew them by their skin and beard […] We tried to resuscitate the child [Ali Haidar] when we pulled him out, but when we checked for a pulse, he was dead.”
Thailand: Prime Minister Should Raise Cross-Border Abuses in Cambodia
(Bangkok) – Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra should raise outstanding human rights concerns with Cambodian leaders during her visit to Phnom Penh on April 23-24, 2025, Human Rights Watch said today. Prime Minister Paetongtarn is scheduled to meet with Prime Minister Hun Manet, Senate President Hun Sen, and King Norodom Sihamoni to mark the 75th anniversary of Thai-Cambodian diplomatic relations.
The Cambodian and Thai governments have engaged in transnational repression—government efforts to silence dissent by committing human rights abuses against their own nationals outside their own territory—through reciprocal arrangements targeting dissidents and opposition figures, colloquially known as a “swap mart.” Both governments have facilitated assaults, abductions, enforced disappearances, and the forced return of people to their home countries where their lives or freedom are at risk.
“Thailand shouldn’t sideline human rights as it seeks to expand its partnership with Cambodia,” said Elaine Pearson, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “Prime Minister Paetongtarn should press her Cambodian counterparts to end transnational abuses that discredit both countries globally and to put their relationship on a rights-respecting footing instead.”
Cambodian authorities have made no progress in arresting suspects responsible for killing Lim Kimya, a dual French-Cambodian national and former member of the Cambodian parliament from the now-dissolved opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP), in Bangkok on January 7, 2025. The Bangkok Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for two Cambodian nationals, Ly Ratanakraksmey and Pich Kimsrin, who are both connected to high-ranking Cambodian government officials and remain at large.
After Kimya’s killing, many critics of the Cambodian government living abroad concluded that nowhere is safe. A number of those who had fled to Thailand have been targets of transnational repression, at times with the cooperation of Thai authorities, Human Rights Watch said.
Thai authorities have frequently used immigration charges to justify the unlawful deportation of Cambodian dissidents and activists without any due process guarantees, including those recognized as refugees by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). On November 25, 2024, Cambodian authorities detained Pen Chan Sangkream, Hong An, Mean Chanthon, Yin Chanthou, Soeung Khunthea, and Vorn Chanratchana after they were forcibly returned by Thai immigration officials. The six opposition party supporters were charged without basis with plotting to commit an attack under article 453 of Cambodia’s criminal code, which is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
In 2021 Thailand forcibly returned two Cambodian refugees associated with the CNRP, subjecting them to politically motivated charges and persecution in Cambodia. One of them, Voeung Samnang, fled to Thailand in 2020 following the crackdown on the CNRP. In December 2024, Cambodian courts upheld a six-year prison sentence for Samnang under charges of plotting to commit an attack and incitement. The other, Veourn Veasna, was released in 2024 following an apology and temporary defection to the ruling Cambodian People’s Party. Both men had received refugee status from UNHCR.
Under the military rule of Gen. Prayut Chan-ocha, who took power in Thailand following a coup in May 2014, Thai authorities aggressively pursued exiled critics of the monarchy who had fled to Cambodia and subjected them to surveillance, intimidation, and physical attacks.
On June 4, 2020, armed men in Phnom Penh abducted the prominent pro-democracy activist, Wanchalearm Satsaksit. Cambodian authorities have failed to seriously and transparently investigate this case, while successive Thai governments have not pressed Cambodia for results. Prime Minister Paetongtarn has not responded to the National Human Rights Commission of Thailand’s report accusing Thai officials of involvement in Wanchalearm’s enforced disappearance.
“Bangkok and Phnom Penh need to immediately end transnational persecution of critics and political opposition figures,” Pearson said. “Prime Minister Paetongtarn should use her visit to Phnom Penh to begin a new chapter of partnership that is based on respect for human rights.”
Thailand: Premier Should Raise Cross-Border Abuses in Cambodia
(Bangkok) – Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra should raise outstanding human rights concerns with Cambodian leaders during her visit to Phnom Penh on April 23-24, 2025, Human Rights Watch said today. Prime Minister Paetongtarn is scheduled to meet with Prime Minister Hun Manet, Senate President Hun Sen, and King Norodom Sihamoni to mark the 75th anniversary of Thai-Cambodian diplomatic relations.
The Cambodian and Thai governments have engaged in transnational repression—government efforts to silence dissent by committing human rights abuses against their own nationals outside their own territory—through reciprocal arrangements targeting dissidents and opposition figures, colloquially known as a “swap mart.” Both governments have facilitated assaults, abductions, enforced disappearances, and the forced return of people to their home countries where their lives or freedom are at risk.
“Thailand shouldn’t sideline human rights as it seeks to expand its partnership with Cambodia,” said Elaine Pearson, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “Prime Minister Paetongtarn should press her Cambodian counterparts to end transnational abuses that discredit both countries globally and to put their relationship on a rights-respecting footing instead.”
Cambodian authorities have made no progress in arresting suspects responsible for killing Lim Kimya, a dual French-Cambodian national and former member of the Cambodian parliament from the now-dissolved opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP), in Bangkok on January 7, 2025. The Bangkok Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for two Cambodian nationals, Ly Ratanakraksmey and Pich Kimsrin, who are both connected to high-ranking Cambodian government officials and remain at large.
After Kimya’s killing, many critics of the Cambodian government living abroad concluded that nowhere is safe. A number of those who had fled to Thailand have been targets of transnational repression, at times with the cooperation of Thai authorities, Human Rights Watch said.
Thai authorities have frequently used immigration charges to justify the unlawful deportation of Cambodian dissidents and activists without any due process guarantees, including those recognized as refugees by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). On November 25, 2024, Cambodian authorities detained Pen Chan Sangkream, Hong An, Mean Chanthon, Yin Chanthou, Soeung Khunthea, and Vorn Chanratchana after they were forcibly returned by Thai immigration officials. The six opposition party supporters were charged without basis with plotting to commit an attack under article 453 of Cambodia’s criminal code, which is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
In 2021 Thailand forcibly returned two Cambodian refugees associated with the CNRP, subjecting them to politically motivated charges and persecution in Cambodia. One of them, Voeung Samnang, fled to Thailand in 2020 following the crackdown on the CNRP. In December 2024, Cambodian courts upheld a six-year prison sentence for Samnang under charges of plotting to commit an attack and incitement. The other, Veourn Veasna, was released in 2024 following an apology and temporary defection to the ruling Cambodian People’s Party. Both men had received refugee status from UNHCR.
Under the military rule of Gen. Prayut Chan-ocha, who took power in Thailand following a coup in May 2014, Thai authorities aggressively pursued exiled critics of the monarchy who had fled to Cambodia and subjected them to surveillance, intimidation, and physical attacks.
On June 4, 2020, armed men in Phnom Penh abducted the prominent pro-democracy activist, Wanchalearm Satsaksit. Cambodian authorities have failed to seriously and transparently investigate this case, while successive Thai governments have not pressed Cambodia for results. Prime Minister Paetongtarn has not responded to the National Human Rights Commission of Thailand’s report accusing Thai officials of involvement in Wanchalearm’s enforced disappearance.
“Bangkok and Phnom Penh need to immediately end transnational persecution of critics and political opposition figures,” Pearson said. “Prime Minister Paetongtarn should use her visit to Phnom Penh to begin a new chapter of partnership that is based on respect for human rights.”
Indonesia: Increasing Attacks on the Media
(Jakarta) – Recent threats and attacks on journalists and news outlets in Indonesia are having a chilling effect on the country’s media, Human Rights Watch said today. The Indonesian government under President Prabowo Subianto Djojohadikusumo should urgently act to protect media freedom, including by taking action against officials who make unsubstantiated public allegations against journalists that undermine the right to freedom of expression.
Journalists were beaten while covering protests, physically attacked by unidentified assailants, and threatened at their workplace, including with animal carcasses. Many of the recent attacks appear to be reprisals for criticism by the media of amendments to the armed forces law that significantly expand the military’s role in governance and weaken legal checks on abusive officials. Senior government officials have also dangerously alleged without basis that journalists and media outlets “promote foreign interest.”
“President Prabowo should recognize that further attacks on journalists and media figures will undercut press freedoms crucial to the government’s plans for economic growth and social justice in Indonesia,” said Meenakshi Ganguly, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The government should ensure that Indonesians are able to freely express their views without fear of retaliation, and that independent media can create an environment for open discussion without harassment or intimidation.”
The media outlet Tempo, which has a long history of public criticism in Indonesia has been especially targeted, apparently because of its critical coverage of the Prabowo administration. On March 20, 2025, Francisca Christy Rosana, a Christian journalist at Tempo who hosts its popular podcast “Bocor Alus Politik” (fine political leaks), received a package containing a pig’s head without its ears, menacingly symbolic in a Muslim-majority nation. She was doxed (her personal information was posted with malicious intent), her mother’s phone was hacked, and a relative received threatening anonymous phone calls.
On March 22, cleaners at Tempo’s office in Jakarta found a box of six rats with their heads cut off. This appeared to be an act of intimidation against the podcast’s six hosts, who discuss sensitive political issues and have criticized the Prabowo administration.
Several journalists have since installed CCTVs and dashboard cameras to identify any assailants. “If the intention is to scare,” said Tempo’s editor-in-chief, Setri Yasra, “we are not deterred.”
On March 24, the police forced two journalists to delete photos and videos from their phones, after the authorities cracked down on a protest in Surabaya against the military law amendments. Rama Indra, a journalist with the local digital outlet Berita Jatim, said that police officers forced him to stop filming as they were beating protesters, and also hit him in the head. The police forced Wildan Pratama, a journalist with the local radio station Suara Surabaya, to delete his photos of arrested protesters. Reporters Without Borders reported that the police and unidentified assailants attacked at least 14 journalists and journalism students who were covering similar protests across the country.
These recent attacks are part of a growing pattern of abuse against the media, Human Rights Watch said. Unidentified men twice smashed the windshield of the podcast host, Hussein Abri Dongoran, in Jakarta, on August 4, 2024, and then again on September 3. Both times his dashboard cameras recorded two men on a single motorcycle throwing a carburetor into the windshield. Tempo reported the cases to the Jakarta police but with no significant result.
Military personnel have also been implicated in attacks on journalists, Human Rights Watch said. In Jayapura, Papua, on October 16, 2024, two men on a motorcycle threw a gasoline bomb at the newsroom of Jubi news media, an independent newspaper, burning two cars. Staff and bystanders eventually extinguished the fire. The Papua police produced a report on January 22, 2025, based on interviews with nine witnesses and CCTV recordings, implicating two Indonesian soldiers in the attack. The Papua police handed over the report to the Indonesian military police in Jayapura for prosecution. But the military returned the report to the police in February, saying that there was insufficient evidence to proceed.
In Kabanjahe, North Sumatra, Rico Sempurna Pasaribu, a reporter with the Medan-based Tribata TV, and three family members, his wife, daughter, and 3-year-old grandson, were found dead inside their small wooden house on June 27, 2024. Police arrested three men. Bebas Ginting, the primary suspect, admitted to the attack during trial, saying that he was ordered “to secure the media” because of Pasaribu’s reporting on illegal online gambling. The order, he said, had come from an army sergeant.
On March 27, 2025, the Kabanjahe court sentenced Ginting and one of the others to life in prison and the other to 20 years. No action has been taken thus far against the sergeant who allegedly ordered the attack. Indonesia’s Press Council has called on the military to follow up on Ginting’s testimony that he was acting on behalf of the military personnel.
In February, the National Police issued a regulation requiring foreign journalists and researchers to obtain police permits to work in “certain locations” without clarifying what or where they are. The regulation, which took effect on March 10, grants police the authority to issue certificates so that they can “provide services and protection” to foreign journalists, especially in conflict-prone areas, the National Police spokesman said.
Human Rights Watch has previously documented the lengthy bureaucratic process, involving 18 state institutions, before foreign journalists can work in Indonesia, assuming their visas are approved in the so-called clearing house at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. West Papua’s six provinces are routinely excluded from approval.
The media have also been subjected to digital attacks. Indonesia’s Journalist Safety Committee recorded multiple digital attacks against media companies, including more than a billion DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attacks against Tempo’s website in April 2025, crippling services for several hours. Other news outlets included Konde, Project Multatuli, and Narasi TV. Several journalists told Human Rights Watch that they had become more cautious in their reporting because of these frequent attacks.
“The Prabowo administration could make a stronger case for Indonesia being a rights-respecting democracy by seriously investigating alleged threats and attacks against the media,” Ganguly said. “The authorities should also withdraw unnecessary restrictions, including travel permit requirements, on foreign journalists and let them do their jobs.”
Tunisia: Harsh Sentences in ‘Conspiracy Case’ Sham Trial
(Beirut) – A Tunisian court on April 19, 2025, sentenced 37 defendants to between 4 and 66 years in prison in the politically motivated “Conspiracy Case,” Human Rights Watch said today. The Tunis Court of First Instance issued the sentences after just three sessions in the mass trial, without providing the defendants with an adequate opportunity to present their defenses and without other due process protections.
On May 2, 2024, a Tunis prosecutor alleged that lawyers, political opponents, activists, researchers, and businessmen were plotting to overthrow President Kais Saied by destabilizing the country, and even of plotting to assassinate him. Forty defendants were charged and referred for trial under numerous articles of Tunisia’s Penal Code and 2015 Counterterrorism Law, including some that carry the death penalty. The court began the trial on March 4. Sentences were handed down against 37 defendants, while the remaining three have complaints pending with the Court of Cassation.
“The Tunisian court did not give defendants so much as a semblance of a fair trial, sentencing them to long terms after a mass trial in which they could not adequately present their case,” said Bassam Khawaja, deputy Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “The Tunisian authorities are making it clear that anyone participating in political opposition or civic activism risks years in prison after a hasty trial without due process.”
According to the judgment, which Human Rights Watch reviewed, the court sentenced the former justice minister and senior Ennahda opposition party leader Noureddine Bhiri to 43 years in prison; the businessman Kamel Ltaief to 66 years; and the opposition politician Khayam Turki to 48 years. Prominent opposition figures Ghazi Chaouachi, Issam Chebbi, Jaouhar Ben Mbarek, Ridha Belhaj, and Chaima Issa were each sentenced to 18 years. Abdelhamid Jelassi, a political activist and former Ennahda party member, and Said Ferjani, a former Ennahda parliament member, were sentenced to 13 years; and Lazhar Akremi, a lawyer and former minister, was sentenced to 8 years. The court sentenced another 15 defendants, including the exiled feminist activist Bochra Belhaj Hamida, to 28 years in prison.
Most defendants are not in custody, and some are outside the country and were tried in absentia. At least 12 were arrested in February 2023, and 8 remained in detention as of January 2025. Some of the defendants had been in abusive pretrial detention for more than two years, beyond the maximum permitted under Tunisian law.
Tunisian authorities have taken additional steps in this case to undermine the right to a fair trial. On February 26, ahead of the first session, the trial court’s president and its prosecutor ordered the detained defendants to appear by videoconference, claiming a “real danger.” Trial by video is inherently abusive as it undermines detainees’ right to be brought physically before a judge to assess their well-being and the legality and conditions of their detention.
In subsequent sessions, the court barred journalists and trial observers, including Human Rights Watch, from entering the courtroom. One defendant, Chaima Issa, was not permitted to enter the courtroom to attend her own trial for the April 11 session.
On April 21, agents of the antiterrorist unit of the National Guard arrested a lawyer in the case, Ahmed Souab, in his home, after he issued statements to the media about the verdict. He was placed in custody under the 2015 counterterrorism law and is accused of “terrorist and common law offenses,” including “threatening to commit terrorist acts with the aim of compelling a person to do or refrain from doing an act and exposing a protected person’s life to danger.”
Other defense lawyers in Tunisia have been subjected to increasing judicial harassment and criminal prosecution for the legitimate exercise of their profession. Ayachi Hammami, previously a defense lawyer in the case, was added as a defendant in May 2023, and was sentenced to eight years in prison.
The Tunisian government has been using arbitrary detention and politically motivated prosecutions to intimidate, punish, and silence critics, Human Rights Watch said. Following President Saied’s takeover of Tunisia’s state institutions on July 25, 2021, the authorities have dramatically intensified their repression of dissent. Since early 2023, they have stepped up arbitrary arrests and detention of people across the political spectrum who were perceived as critical of the government. The authorities’ repeated attacks on the judiciary, including Saied’s dismantling of the High Judicial Council, have severely undermined its independence and jeopardized Tunisians’ right to a fair trial.
Tunisia is a state party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, which guarantee the right to freedom of expression and assembly, to a fair trial, and to not be subject to arbitrary arrest or detention.
Tunisian authorities should overturn these convictions, guarantee fair trials, and stop prosecuting individuals for exercising their human rights, Human Rights Watch said. Tunisia’s international partners should break their silence and urge the government to end its crackdown and to protect space for freedom of expression, association, and peaceful assembly.
“The sham ‘Conspiracy Case’ trial reflects the depths to which President Kais Saied’s government will go to eliminate the last vestiges of political opposition and free speech in the country,” Khawaja said. “Concerned governments need to speak out or Tunisian authorities will continue to pursue manufactured and abusive prosecutions while failing to address the country’s economic crises.”
Texas Bill Would Criminalize Those Transporting Youth for Abortion Care
A harmful bill in the Texas legislature would criminalize transporting youth younger than 18, or funding their transportation, out of state to access abortion without written parental consent.
The legislation, Senate Bill (SB) 2352 and House Bill (HB) 4595, aims to stop young people from getting abortions by making it a second-degree felony, punishable with fines or jail time, to support them in their journey toward accessing care.
Young people across the United States already face extraordinary barriers accessing abortion.
Texas is one of 12 states where abortion is banned completely with almost no exceptions. Many other states ban abortion after 6 weeks, prohibit health insurance coverage for abortion care, or force people to receive biased “counseling” and wait up to 72 hours afterward before obtaining an abortion.
Many states have laws requiring youth under 18 to notify or get consent from a parent or legal guardian before an abortion. Most young people involve a parent or legal guardian in an abortion decision. But some fear that involving a parent could irreparably harm their family relationships, cause them to lose housing, expose them to abuse, or force them to continue a pregnancy against their will.
Young people in these circumstances can go before a judge to get permission for an abortion without involving a parent, an intimidating and burdensome process known as “judicial bypass.” After researching forced parental involvement laws and judicial bypass in several states, Human Rights Watch concluded that these laws violate young people’s rights and should be repealed.
On top of these legal hurdles, traveling out of state for abortion takes time and resources, and may require negotiating time away from work or school. Navigating these logistics can be significantly harder for young people.
Now, after forcing people to leave the state for care, legislators are threatening people who help youth to do so with up to 20 years in prison and potential fines.
SB 2352 and HB 4595 are part of a spate of recent bills that aim to criminalize abortion support, including abortion funds and other organizations that offer financial aid and help with logistics like transportation, accommodations, and childcare.
Access to abortion is a human right, and everyone should be able to access abortion without fear of criminal penalties for themselves or those supporting them. Texas lawmakers should reject this harmful bill.
UAE: Dissidents, Relatives Designated ‘Terrorists’
(Beirut, April 22, 2025) – Emirati authorities have designated as “terrorist” 11 political dissidents and their relatives as well as 8 companies they own, reflecting the country’s indiscriminate use of overbroad counterterrorism laws and contempt for due process, Human Rights Watch said today. The authorities should immediately remove the terrorism designations.
On January 8, 2025, Emirati authorities announced a cabinet decision unilaterally adding the 11 individuals and 8 companies to its terrorism list for their alleged links to the Muslim Brotherhood, without due process. The authorities did not inform these individuals or entities prior to the designation, nor was there any opportunity to respond to or contest the allegations. The move represents an escalation of the United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) transnational repression, targeting not only dissidents but also their family members.
“Throwing nineteen people and companies onto a list of alleged terrorists without any semblance of due process, and with serious ramifications for their livelihoods, makes a mockery of the rule of law,” said Joey Shea, United Arab Emirates researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The UK government should step in to defend British businesses against the spurious claims of Emirati authorities, particularly as it edges closer to signing a free trade agreement with Gulf countries that appears to lack even basic human rights protections.”
Human Rights Watch found that all eight companies are solely registered in the United Kingdom and are owned or previously owned by exiled Emirati dissidents or their relatives. At least nine of the eleven designated individuals are political dissidents or their relatives.
Only two of the eleven have been convicted or accused of a terrorist offense, though both under questionable circumstances, according to informed sources and the Emirates Detainees Advocacy Center (EDAC), a human rights organization supporting imprisoned human rights defenders in the UAE. One was convicted in absentia as part of the grossly unfair “UAE94” mass trial of political dissidents in 2013. The other was accused in a separate case related to supporting the “UAE94” detainees.
Individuals on the list found out about the designation only after the Emirates News Agency (WAM), the UAE’s official state news agency, published it on its website. It came as “a real shock, it was very difficult,” one of the people named told Human Rights Watch.
Another said that he was “surprised that our names just appeared on the terrorism case” because there was “no case, no judge’s decision.”
“I have never been convicted nor there is any case against me,” another said.
Human Rights Watch searched for the individuals and companies on global terror and financial sanctions lists, including the United Nations Global Sanctions list, the European Union Sanctions list, and the Consolidated List of Financial Sanctions Targets in the UK. None of them are included in these internationally recognized lists.
The UAE’s 2014 counterterrorism law uses an overly broad definition of terrorism and allows the executive branch to designate individuals and entities as terrorists without any corresponding legal requirement to demonstrate the objective basis of the claim. It does not set out a clear procedure for how this authority should be exercised, nor does it provide for any oversight.
Designated individuals face immediate asset freezes and property confiscation under the counterterrorism law and Cabinet Decision No. 74/2020. Those in the UAE, including relatives or friends, face a possible sentence of life in prison for communicating with anyone on the list. Human Rights Watch found that the designation has negatively affected individuals’ careers and personal finances, including through lost career opportunities and clients.
Exiled Emirati dissidents said the designations are part of the UAE’s ongoing crackdown on dissent and political opposition. “They want to hurt us as much as possible,” one individual whose name appeared on the list said.
Over the last decade, Emirati authorities have repeatedly targeted the Muslim Brotherhood and its Emirati branch, the Reform and Social Guidance Association (Al-Islah), in a widespread crackdown. Al-Islah is a nonviolent group that engaged in peaceful political debate in the UAE for many years prior to the crackdown and advocated greater adherence to Islamic precepts. Many of the detainees from the grossly unfair “UAE94” mass trial in 2013 are members of Al-Islah. The UAE designated the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization in 2014.
“The UAE government rejects the existence of political opposition or any opinion that contradicts its policies, so it seeks to silence all voices,” said one person named in the list.
The 2014 counterterrorism law enables the courts to convict peaceful government critics as terrorists and sentence them to death. The law has been repeatedly used against political dissidents. In July 2024, 53 human rights defenders and political dissidents were sentenced to abusively long terms in the country’s second-largest unfair mass trial.
The UN’s first special rapporteur on counterterrorism and human rights has said that terrorism should be defined as narrowly as possible, warning that “the adoption of overly broad definitions … carries the potential for deliberate misuse of the term … as well as unintended human rights abuses.”
“Emirati authorities are abusing a vague terrorism law to smear and ostracize dissidents, criminalizing even mere contact with them,” Shea said. “They should immediately reverse these insidious designations and cease cracking down on peaceful expression.”
For additional detail and accounts by those on the list, please see below.
The Harmful Effects of Being Designated a Terrorist
Individuals on the list said the designation has negatively affected their careers and personal finances.
“I was assigned a project in a [MENA state], but I can’t go there because they are friends with the UAE,” one person said. “It’s a weird situation to go to your manager and say you are on a terrorist list…. Putting this news out there, with your full name, it impacts your reputation and social standing.”
A “terrorist” designation results in immediate asset freezes and property confiscations. The Emirates News Agency said: “Financial institutions and regulatory bodies are mandated to take the necessary actions, in line with the laws and regulations in force in the UAE.”
The designation also criminalizes communication with designated “terrorists” and imposes penalties up to life in prison. This further isolates designated individuals, leaving UAE-based relatives vulnerable to long prison terms for merely communicating with them. “It is harder to get in touch with our families,” one person on the list said.
Another said that he has been unable to reach his family since the announcement. “I have called several times and they don’t respond, which was never the case before. Now I am calling my mother, my sisters and no one is picking up the phone, it is a clear thing…. Previously I was able to call my mother to talk to her, but now I am not able to reach out to her; this is part of the pressure on the family there.”
Lack of Due Process or Recourse
The UAE’s 2014 counterterrorism law uses an overly broad definition of terrorism. Article 1 broadly defines a “terrorist outcome” as, among other things, “stirring panic among a group of people” and “antagonizing the state,” without requiring an intent to cause death or serious injury or other elements to ensure that peaceful dissent is not labelled “terrorism.”
Commenting on the counterterrorism law in November 2020, several UN experts warned that the executive branch “could approve the proscription of any entity as a terrorist entity without being required to legally demonstrate that there is objective reason to believe that such a designation is justified, despite the far-reaching implications that such a designation could have.” UN experts also warned that the law “could contribute to an arbitrary and unreasonable use of these powers,” potentially leading to the “criminalisation or persecution of organisations or individuals that are not ‘genuinely’ terrorist in nature.”
Article 60 of the counterterrorism law allows for a person whose name has been added to the terrorism list to file a grievance. It says that “the grievant is entitled to challenge the decision of insertion within sixty days from the date of rejecting such grievance or delay of the comment thereof.”
None of the individuals or entities named in the January cabinet decision have filed a grievance, according to informed sources and the Emirates Detainees Advocacy Center, at least in part because they do not trust the process or institutions. One individual said: “State entities are facades for the security apparatus, which controls all aspects of the state, and there is no independent place that you can address or complain to.”
Crackdown on Dissent
The UAE regularly uses accusations of terrorism to persecute and harass peaceful dissidents. “These threats and harassment are meant to put you under pressure and stress all the time and not allow you to live your life in a normal way,” one individual told Human Rights Watch.
Others felt the designation was part of a broader effort to pressure those in exile to return to the UAE, where they would face severe penalties, including by putting pressure on their families and companies. “They are trying to pressure us to go back,” said one person who lives in exile.
The UAE appears to be escalating its persecution beyond openly outspoken dissidents to include family members who have not participated in politics nor spoken publicly about the country’s human rights record. “Many people whose names are on the list, they didn’t speak loudly against the government,” one person said.
In 2021, the UAE added 38 individuals and 15 entities to its terrorism list, including 4 prominent exiled Emirati dissidents. Human Rights Watch found that 14 of the 38 individuals and two of the entities are on other international global terror and financial sanctions lists. None of the individuals nor entities added on January 2025 were found on other internationally recognized lists.
British Companies Smeared
The January 2025 cabinet decision added eight companies to the UAE’s terrorist list. All eight companies are solely registered in the UK, according to the UK’s Companies House. Seven of the entities have current directors who are known Emirati political dissidents or the relatives of dissidents, and one entity has a former director who is a known Emirati political dissident.
None of the eight entities appear on internationally recognized global terror and financial sanctions lists.
Three companies are registered to Ahmed al-Nuaimi, an exiled Emirati dissident based in the UK. Al-Nuaimi regularly appears on panels about the UAE’s human rights record and openly criticizes the government’s abuses. Emirati authorities added al-Nuaimi to its terrorist list in 2021.
One of the three companies owned by al-Nuaimi is Cambridge Education and Training Centre, which offers education training courses to educators and parents as well as camps for children and youth. In 2024, the company organized a “weekend adventure” outdoor field trip for school-aged children, which offered activities such as rock climbing.
Al-Nuaimi said that the designation has harmed his business. “We lost some of our clients, especially from Arab countries, because they are afraid to contact us. Anyone from a country who has a good relationship with the UAE, it will affect us,” he said.
Others also said that the designation resulted in the loss of clients. “Clients were not answering me, they were disappearing on me,” one person said. “I was depressed because I felt my business and everything was collapsing.” Another said that all business coming from the UAE to their company had been canceled.
Another designated company, Wasla for All, offered workshops and clubs to support children learning Arabic and oversaw a second-hand Arabic bookshop in the UK. Its Instagram account shows the company participating at the World Arabic Language Day Celebration Conference and organizing Arabic storytelling, crafts, and quizzes for young children.
The January 2025 Cabinet decision also designated UK-registered Future Graduates Ltd. as a terrorist entity. Future Graduates helps to facilitate university applications for students wanting to study in the UK. Mohammed Saqr al-Zaabi, an exiled Emirati dissident, was a director and owner of the company from July 2015 to September 2021. In September 2021, he sold his shares and has had no relationship with the company since then.
Al-Zaabi is the former president of the Emirates Jurists Association, one of UAE’s most prominent civil society organizations until 2011, when the government issued a decree to dissolve its board of directors as part of a broader crackdown on peaceful dissent. Al-Zaabi is now based in the UK and was added to the UAE’s abusive terrorism list in 2021.
Al-Zaabi said he believes Future Graduates was designated because of his previous connection with the company. “They want to make it hard for us,” he said. “They don’t want us to live inside or outside the country, they want to put us in a cage.”
The UK government has been pursuing a Free Trade Agreement with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) without any clear human rights protections. Human Rights Watch has urged the UK and GCC countries to incorporate strong human rights conditions in any future agreement and not conclude the deal until there is detailed public transparency around the rights protections in it.
Vietnam: Crackdown on Dissent Intensifies
(Bangkok) – The Vietnamese government has intensified its crackdown on dissent to punish people simply for raising concerns or complaints about government policies or local officials, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today.
The 26-page report, “‘We’ll All Be Arrested Soon’: Abusive Prosecutions under Vietnam’s ‘Infringing of State Interests’ Law,” documents the Vietnamese government’s increased use of article 331 of the penal code to target those who use social media and other means to publicly raise issues including religious freedom, land rights, rights of Indigenous people, and corruption by the government and the Communist Party of Vietnam. The authorities should immediately end the systemic repression, and release everyone detained or imprisoned for exercising their basic rights.
“The Vietnamese authorities abuse the ‘infringing of state interests’ law not only to silence prominent activists and whistleblowers, but to retaliate against ordinary people who complain about poor services or police abuse,” said Patricia Gossman, associate Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “Article 331 is the government’s handy tool to infringe upon the basic rights of Vietnamese citizens.”
Human Rights Watch examined dozens of Vietnamese court documents, numerous media sources, and hundreds of posts and videos on social media. Between 2018 and February 2025, Vietnamese courts convicted and sentenced at least 124 people to harsh prison terms under article 331. This is a significant increase over the previous six-year period (2011-2017), when only 28 people were reportedly convicted and sentenced to prison for violating the predecessor to article 331.
In the past, people who were convicted under the law were often bloggers or human rights activists: those the government sought to silence but who were not considered threats to the Communist Party’s monopoly on power. They were convicted of crimes considered less serious than crimes against national security.
But Human Rights Watch found that the authorities have enlarged the scope and application of article 331 so that it reaches much further into society, beyond human rights and democracy dissidents – most of whom are now in prison – to all those publicly voicing grievances. As a result, ordinary people face arrest and up to seven years in prison for criticizing low-level officials.
Those sentenced under article 331 include:
Dao Ba Cuong, an ironworker who staged a protest inside his home after his son died in police custody in October 2022. A family member livestreamed the protest on social media. Dao Ba Cuong also wore funeral clothes and carried a portrait of his son through the streets to raise awareness about his son’s death. In December 2023, a court in Phu Yen province sentenced him to two years in prison.Vu Thi Kim Hoang allowed her partner, Nguyen Thai Hung, to live in her house and use her laptop, which he used to discuss political issues on social media. As a punishment for hosting him, in November 2022, a Dong Nai court sentenced her to two years and six months in prison. In the same trial, Nguyen Thai Hung received a four-year prison sentence.Danh Minh Quang, an ethnic Khmer, complained on social media about discrimination against Khmer – including withholding aid during the Covid-19 pandemic – and advocated recognition of Indigenous people. In February 2024, a court in Soc Trang province sentenced him to three years and six months in prison.Le Minh The discussed sociopolitical issues including economic development, corruption, poverty, and land rights on social media. He served 21 months in prison between 2018-2020 for voicing his opinions. In 2023, he was arrested again, convicted, and sentenced to two years in prison, also for criticizing the authorities. Le Minh The’s younger sister, Le Thi Binh, also served two years in prison between 2020-2022 for “posting, livestreaming, and sharing” content that “defames” state’s policies.The Vietnamese authorities’ increased use of article 331 is a little-known facet of the government’s expanding crackdown on dissent, Human Rights Watch said. It reflects the government’s failure – despite its growing international profile and membership in the United Nations Human Rights Council – to address social issues in a manner consistent with human rights and good governance.
“Vietnam’s trade partners have been routinely overlooking the government’s heightened abuse of human rights in the name of economic development and investment opportunities,” Gossman said. “International donors and trade partners should publicly and privately press Vietnam to immediately release anyone held for peacefully expressing their opinions online, and repeal the ‘infringing of state interests’ law.”
This Earth Day, Let’s Talk Phasing Out Fossil Fuels
Earth Day, which in 2016 marked the opening for signature of the Paris Agreement on climate change, now takes place amid record-breaking global heat and rising fossil fuel production. Yet it also offers a vital opportunity for governments to enforce environmental protections and fulfill their human rights obligations.
Around the world, the communities most exposed to the extraction, manufacturing, use of, and disposal of fossil fuel products – including Indigenous, Black, rural communities, and those living in poverty – face ongoing rights violations tied to toxic air, unsafe water, and polluted ecosystems. The climate crisis, fueled by oil, gas, and coal, is already displacing communities worldwide.
One key tool that governments have to prevent such harms is the environmental review process. Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) seek to thoroughly evaluate risks before fossil fuel permits are granted or denied. But as Human Rights Watch recently documented in a submission to the United Nations special rapporteur on the right to a healthy environment, these safeguards are often undermined or reduced to box-ticking exercises. Weak enforcement, poor-quality assessments, and limited information and participation leave affected communities without protection.
Courts are starting to close this accountability gap. In the United Kingdom, the Supreme Court ruled that when evaluating oil projects, authorities must account for downstream greenhouse gas emissions in EIAs, a decision that could reshape fossil fuel approvals. This month, Norway’s Supreme Court reinstated a ban on three North Sea oil and gas fields after authorities failed to assess their full climate impacts.
In Brazil, technical staff at the environmental agency, Ibama, recommended rejecting an application by the state oil company, Petrobras, to drill off the coast of the Amazon rainforest, citing deficiencies in the information provided by the company in the context of the project’s environmental assessment, such as in the fauna rescue plan. As Brazil´s government prepares to host the UN climate conference COP30, it has an opportunity to show that bold climate action starts with protecting rights at home by rejecting new oil and gas exploration projects that could harm the climate and human rights.
Earth Day is a reminder for governments to step up efforts to mitigate fossil fuel harm. Enforcing EIAs can stop reckless fossil fuel expansion and confront the climate crisis at its source. Tools exist. What’s needed now more than ever is the will to use them.
One Man’s Ordeal Triggers Test of US Constitution
This week, US federal court judges pushed back on the Trump administration’s abusive deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who, along with over 200 others accused of gang membership, was unlawfully transferred to a maximum security prison in El Salvador a month ago.
The Trump administration admits transferring Abrego Garcia in contravention of a court order was an error. But Abrego Garcia, originally from El Salvador, is still stuck there.
The stakes are clear. As my colleague Juanita Goebertus wrote in a sworn declaration, those in El Salvador’s prisons face torture, ill-treatment, and little prospect for release. Moreover, Abrego Garcia was imprisoned there without due process.
In upholding a ruling that the government must “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return to the US, the Supreme Court exercised its constitutionally mandated authority to check executive overreach.
Yet the Trump administration insists it cannot correct the situation. Instead of finding a solution, President Trump used a meeting with El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, to emphasize that it intends to do nothing . President Donald Trump even speculated about sending US citizens to El Salvador’s jails.
They clearly can do more; the administration has not even asked El Salvador to return Abrego Garcia. The United States has a long history of securing the release of people arbitrarily detained abroad.
On April 17, a federal fourth circuit judge appointed by former Republican President Ronald Reagan issued a scathing order, rejecting the government’s claims:
“The government …. claims in essence that because it has rid itself of custody (of Abrego Garcia) that there is nothing that can be done. This should be shocking not only to judges, but to the intuitive sense of liberty that Americans far removed from courthouses still hold dear."
Members of the US Congresshave also pushed back. Senator Chris van Hollen of Maryland, where Abrego Garcia lived with his US citizen wife and children, traveled to El Salvador, lobbying on Abrego Garcia’s behalf. Van Hollen reports that while Abrego Garcia is still in detention, as of nine days ago he had been moved to a facility with comparatively better conditions but is still being held incommunicado. El Salvador’s vice president told van Hollen that the Trump administration is paying El Salvador to keep Abrego Garcia and others in its jails, the sentator said.
Other senators and house members demanded Secretary of State Marco Rubio disclose the details of the administration’s agreement with El Salvador. Members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus have appealed directly to Bukele.
The fourth circuit judge’s ruling closes with a warning: “Now the [governmental] branches come too close to grinding irrevocably against one another in a conflict that promises to diminish both. This is a losing proposition all around.”
Indeed, Abrego Garcia’s plight represents a challenge to the constitutional order itself.