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Click to expand Image Community members attend a vigil for Renee Nicole Good, following a fatal shooting by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer in Minneapolis, Minnesota, US, January 7, 2026.  © 2026 Jaida Grey Eagle/Bloomberg via Getty Images

(Washington, DC, January 9, 2026) – The killing of a woman in Minneapolis by a federal immigration officer on January 7, 2026, was unjustifiable, Human Rights Watch said today. Three videos of the incident shared on social media, verified by Human Rights Watch and media outlets, clearly contradict federal officials’ claims that the woman “weaponized her vehicle” or attempted to kill officers before an agent opened fire.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers confronted the 37-year-old US citizen, Renee Nicole Good, on a residential street in south Minneapolis, which a witness said Good was blocking with her car. As Good attempted to drive away from the officers, one shot her three times at close range. A statement by Good’s wife in a local media outlet indicated the two had been alerting neighbors of ICE’s presence. “We had whistles,” the statement said. “They had guns.” 

“Over the past year, ICE and other federal agents have been abusing immigrant communities across the United States with impunity,” said Ida Sawyer, crisis, conflict and arms director at Human Rights Watch. “This horrific incident is the latest sign that their abusive tactics put lives at risk, including people not subject to immigration enforcement.”

Human Rights Watch analyzed three videos of the shooting and one of the immediate aftermath and reviewed four witness accounts on local media outlets.

In a video shared on social media by a Minnesota Reformer reporter and later published by NBC News, Good is in the driver’s seat of a burgundy Honda Pilot, stationary in the middle of the road, as unmarked vehicles attempt to pass. Good appears to signal at them to go around. One vehicle does, and she signals for a second vehicle to pass, but it stops perpendicular to Good’s car. Two officers get out and walk toward Good, shouting: “Get out of the car.”

One of them tries to open the driver’s seat door by grabbing the handle and then reaching inside the window. A third officer approaches from the passenger side. Good briefly reverses in an apparent attempt to get away from the officers. The third officer walks to the driver’s side as Good begins to turn and drive in the opposite direction of the officers. Pulling out his gun, the third officer fires three shots in short succession at eye level, first through the windshield, then through the driver’s seat window. Good’s car speeds up and crashes into a parked car a short distance away. 

A second video of the incident, filmed by the shooting officer, shows Good turning her steering wheel and accelerating away from the officers. Good and her vehicle are then out of frame as the officer fires his gun. A third video of the incident is consistent with this analysis, showing Good’s vehicle pulling away from the officers as gunshots are heard. 

Video analysis shows that when the shots were fired, the officer could not have reasonably feared death or serious physical injury. 

In another video filmed afterward, a bystander standing across the street of Good’s car asks: “Can I go check a pulse? I’m a physician.” One officer refuses. Good can be seen, still inside the vehicle, bloodied and motionless, while several officers stand around the vehicle without making an apparent effort to provide immediate medical support. 

The Minneapolis city government reported that police officers who responded to the incident found Good with “life-threatening gunshot wounds” and Minneapolis firefighters provided medical attention until paramedics arrived. Two witnesses told media that the ICE vehicles parked in the street impeded the ambulance, forcing paramedics to reach Good on foot from the end of the block. The city government reported that Good later died in the hospital.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) quickly issued a statement claiming that Good tried to kill ICE officers with her vehicle in “an act of domestic terrorism.” This account is entirely inconsistent with any reasonable analysis of the video footage, Human Rights Watch said. 

Good’s killing comes amid increased deployment of federal immigration officers to Minneapolis. 

Thousands of people gathered at a vigil on the night of January 7 to honor Good’s memory and protest ICE’s presence in Minneapolis. The shooting has sparked demonstrations in other cities, including New York, San Francisco, Chicago, and Seattle.

Good’s killing fits a broader pattern of incidents involving the use of firearms under questionable circumstances during immigration enforcement operations, Human Rights Watch said. On December 24, 2025, an ICE officer shot Tiago Alexandre Sousa-Martins in his vehicle in Glen Burnie, Maryland, causing him to crash. DHS claimed that Sousa-Martins had “weaponized his vehicle,” ramming into ICE vehicles and driving it “directly at ICE officers.” While footage of the shooting has not circulated, a local police statement calls DHS’s account into question, asserting that a second man injured in the crash was not a passenger in Sousa-Martins’ car, as DHS said, but was instead injured while detained in an ICE vehicle. 

In October, in Chicago, a Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) agent shot Marimar Martinez five times. The next day, Martinez was criminally charged and accused of striking a CBP vehicle with her car, but the case was dismissed. In September, an ICE officer shot Silverio Villegas-Gonzalez near Chicago, claiming he “drove his car at law enforcement officers.” But CCTV footage does not show his car driving at or hitting law enforcement officers.

Justice Department policy explicitly prohibits law enforcement officers from discharging firearms “solely to disable moving vehicles.” Even when a “vehicle is operated in a manner that threatens to cause death or serious physical injury,” an officer may not discharge a firearm if they can reasonably avoid the harm, including by “moving out of the path of the vehicle.” Under international human rights standards, law enforcement officers can only intentionally use lethal force “when strictly unavoidable to protect life.” These standards also establish that law enforcement should ensure that injured people receive medical aid as soon as possible.

Human Rights Watch has documented other incidents of government agents’ excessive use of force against immigrants and people protesting increased raids and detentions since the Trump administration launched its violent immigration enforcement campaign last year. These abuses are compounded when law enforcement obscure their identity with face coverings, which has become a widespread practice among federal immigration enforcement agents and creates a barrier to accountability.

The Trump administration has dismantled key oversight mechanisms for DHS, including the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties (CRCL), which could investigate an unlawful shooting by ICE but has had its capacity decimated through drastic staffing cuts. 

On January 7, the Minneapolis police chief said that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA), a criminal investigation agency within the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, would jointly investigate the shooting. However, the following day, BCA reported that it was closing its investigation after the FBI said it would no longer allow BCA access to evidence, and would instead lead the investigation alone.

Local and federal authorities should support one another’s efforts to thoroughly and impartially investigate Good’s killing, Human Rights Watch said. In the absence of strong internal DHS oversight mechanisms, the congressional DHS committees should hold oversight hearings.

“Good’s death is a horrifying example of the dangers posed by law enforcement agencies that have been empowered to act recklessly and sends a threatening and potentially chilling message to immigrants, protesters, and bystanders alike,” Sawyer said. “The authorities should investigate the killing publicly and thoroughly and ensure that justice is done.”

Click to expand Image Nigerien military police stand guard outside airbases in Niamey, as supporters of Niger's military junta gather on August 27, 2023. © 2023 AFP via Getty Images

Niger’s military junta adopted a sweeping “general mobilization” decree on December 26. The new law grants authorities far-reaching powers to confront security threats, but at the expense of human rights.

The decree establishes a broad legal framework allowing the government to summon citizens, seize goods, compel the reporting of alleged “hostile activities,” and restrict communications deemed harmful to “national mobilization efforts.” Authorities say the measure is intended to “preserve the integrity of the national territory and state sovereignty” and protect people and institutions from internal and external threats.

The decree risks becoming an instrument of repression in a country where civic space has steadily narrowed since the July 2023 military coup. Because the provisions are broad, they could be used to suppress peaceful dissent and restrict the rights to freedom of movement and expression. One clause, for example, obligates citizens to report the presence of any “foreign national from a hostile country.” Such vague terminology invites abuse and could be weaponized to target critics of the junta.

These concerns arise amid the military junta’s crackdown on the political opposition, independent media, civil society, and trade unions. The authorities continue to arbitrarily detain former President Mohamed Bazoum and his wife, held since the coup, as well as the prominent human rights defender Moussa Tiangari, among others.

Niger faces worsening insecurity, particularly in the western Tillabéry region, where Islamist armed groups linked to the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda have carried out repeated attacks on civilians as well as security forces.

Under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Niger is a party, governments may impose restrictions on certain rights during a state of emergency, but they must be tailored to the “exigencies of the situation.” The United Nations Human Rights Committee has stressed that limits on free expression must be narrowly defined and not undermine the right itself.

Under the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, no restriction on charter rights is allowed during a time of emergency.

Niger’s junta should not use threats to the country’s security to plunge the country into an ever-deeper human rights morass, but recognize that upholding fundamental freedoms is key to restoring security. Legal safeguards and independent oversight mechanisms should be urgently adopted to prevent abuse of the mobilization decree.

Click to expand Image Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney (L) with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Gyeongju, South Korea, October 31, 2025. © 2025 Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press via AP Photo

(Ottawa) – Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney should make human rights a key focus of his visit to China from January 13 to 17, 2026, Human Rights Watch said today. Carney’s trip to China is the first by a Canadian prime minister in more than eight years. Canada-China relations have been strained in recent years as Chinese President Xi Jinping has intensified repression both inside China and abroad. The Chinese government unlawfully detained two Canadians as hostages between 2018 and 2021 to pressure the Canadian government to free an executive of the Chinese tech giant Huawei.

“Prime Minister Carney should recognize that the Chinese government’s deepening repression threatens not just the rights of people in China but, increasingly, Canada’s core interests and values,” said Maya Wang, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “Carney should ensure that engagements with the Chinese government on trade and security are consistent with Canada’s values, which includes the promotion of human rights.”

Key issues Carney should raise include links between the Chinese government’s forced labor and imports to Canada; the persecution and imprisonment of human rights defenders; and China’s targeting of critics abroad, including in Canada. Carney should also raise concerns about drones produced by China-based companies being sold to Russia and then used to attack civilians in Ukraine.

The Canadian government’s official statement announcing the visit said that it is part of Canada’s efforts to build economic resilience and to diversify from the United States, by “elevating” Canada-China “engagement on trade, energy, agriculture, and international security.” There was no mention of human rights.

The Chinese government’s rights violations have a direct impact on many issues of national interest to Canada, Human Rights Watch said.

Canadian law prohibits importing products produced wholly or in part by forced labor. There is extensive and consistent documentation of Chinese state-imposed forced labor involving ethnic Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslim communities in China’s cotton, automotive, solar, and critical mineral supply chains. There is evidence that some firms linked to forced labor in Xinjiang, a predominantly Muslim Uyghur region, ship products to Canada. The United Nations, Human Rights Watch, and other organizations have for several years reported on crimes against humanity by Chinese authorities in Xinjiang.

Carney should press the Chinese government to end its repression in Xinjiang and ensure full compliance with international labor rights conventions that China recently ratified, including International Labour Organization (ILO) Convention No. 29 on forced labor and ILO Convention No. 105 on state-imposed forced labor.

The Chinese government’s labor rights abuses extend beyond the Uyghur region, Human Rights Watch said. Its laws prohibit independent labor unions, and it detains and imprisons labor activists, cracks down on labor protests, and has shuttered labor monitoring organizations in Hong Kong.

“Canadians shouldn’t have to worry about purchasing products tainted by forced labor,” Wang said. “Pressing Beijing to ensure that businesses respect workers’ rights protects Canadian consumers.”

In Hong Kong, where an estimated 300,000 Canadians live, the Chinese government has largely dismantled freedoms of expression, association, and assembly; free and fair elections; fair trial rights; and judicial independence. In December, 2025, Jimmy Lai, founder of the now-defunct Apple Daily, was found guilty under Hong Kong’s draconian national security laws. He faces a sentence of up to life in prison. Carney should press for Lai’s immediate release.

China has also increasingly carried out cross-border abuses—known as transnational repression—to oppress critics of the government abroad, including residents and citizens in Canada. In one case, the Chinese government harassed a Canadian political candidate and a China critic during an election campaign. While Canadian officials have spoken out about some cross-border abuses, Carney should show that his government is taking transnational repression seriously by raising the issue directly with President Xi.

Human Rights Watch in June documented Russia’s use of commercial drones produced by China-based companies to attack civilians in Kherson, Ukraine. Carney should press the Chinese government to ensure that these drone companies prevent sales to sanctioned entities and cooperate with investigations into unlawful attacks on civilians in Ukraine.

“The Chinese government’s abuses fall hard on the people of China, but they also affect people around the world,” Wang said. “During his visit, Prime Minister Carney shouldn’t squander his opportunity to use diplomatic channels to raise human rights concerns.”

Click to expand Image Pictures of 28 people killed by Iranian security forces between December 31, 2025 and January 3, 2026 during crackdowns against protesters in Iran.  © Amnesty International

(Beirut) – Iranian authorities have unleashed a deadly crackdown on protesters across the country since December 28, 2025, marked by security forces’ unlawful use of force and firearms and mass arbitrary arrests, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said today.

The organizations’ findings reveal how security forces—including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and Iran’s police force, known by its Persian acronym FARAJA—have unlawfully used rifles, shotguns loaded with metal pellets, water cannons, tear gas, and beatings to disperse, intimidate, and punish largely peaceful protesters.

The crackdown has resulted in the killing of at least 28 protesters and bystanders, including children, in 13 cities across 8 provinces between December 31, 2025, and January 3, 2026, based on credible information gathered by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.

“People in Iran daring to express their anger at decades of repression and demand fundamental change are once again being met with a deadly pattern of security forces unlawfully firing at, chasing, arresting, and beating protesters in scenes reminiscent of the Woman Life Freedom uprising of 2022. Iran’s top security body, the Supreme National Security Council, must immediately issue orders for security forces to stop the unlawful use of force and firearms,” said Diana Eltahawy, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa. “

Protests erupted on December 28, 2025, following a sharp currency collapse and amid soaring inflation, chronic state mismanagement of essential services including access to water, and worsening living conditions. Starting with shop closures and strikes in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar, protests quickly spread nationwide, evolving into street demonstrations calling for the downfall of the Islamic Republic system and demanding human rights, dignity, and freedom. The authorities responded with violent dispersals and mass arrests, with hundreds already arbitrarily detained and at risk of torture and other ill-treatment.

“The frequency and persistence with which the Iranian security forces have unlawfully used force, including lethal force, against protesters, combined with systematic impunity for members of the security forces who commit grave violations, indicate that the use of such weapons to crush protests remains entrenched as state policy,” said Michael Page, deputy Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch.

Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International spoke to 26 people, including protesters, eyewitnesses, human rights defenders, journalists, and a medical professional, reviewed official statements, and analyzed dozens of verified videos published online or shared with the organizations. An independent pathologist consulted by Amnesty International reviewed images of protesters injured or killed.

Senior state officials have demonized protesters as “rioters” and vowed a “firm” crackdown. 

On January 3, 2026, when security forces killed at least 11 protesters, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said “rioters should be put in their place.” On the same day, the IRGC’s provincial corps of Lorestan province declared that the period of “tolerance” was over, pledging to target “rioters, organizers and leaders of anti-security movements … without leniency.” 

On January 5, 2026, the Head of the Judiciary also ordered prosecutors to show “no leniency” to protesters and to expedite their trials. 

United Nations member states and regional bodies, such as the European Union, should issue unequivocal public condemnations and undertake urgent diplomatic action to pressure the Iranian authorities to stop the bloodshed, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said. 

Given the prevailing climate of systemic impunity that has enabled Iranian authorities to repeatedly commit crimes under international law documented by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, including murder, torture, rape, and enforced disappearances to eliminate and punish dissent, the organizations call on other countries’ prosecution authorities to initiate criminal investigations under the principle of universal jurisdiction, with a view to issuing arrest warrants for those suspected of responsibility. 

Unlawful Use of Force and Killings 

The 28 victims were all shot by security forces, including with metal pellets fired from shotguns. Consistent with well-documented patterns of state denial and silencing, authorities have denied responsibility for the killings. Officials forced some victims’ families to appear on state media to call the deaths accidents or to blame other protesters, threatening the families with reprisal and secret burials of their loved ones if they did not comply.

Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch found that protesters have been largely peaceful. While the organizations have reviewed some footage and reports indicating that some protesters have engaged in acts of violence, in all the incidents of shootings investigated by the organizations, there was no imminent threat to life or serious injury justifying the use of firearms.

According to evidence gathered by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, the provinces of Lorestan and Ilam, home to the Kurdish and Luri ethnic minorities, saw the deadliest repression, with at least eight killed in Lorestan and five killed in Ilam. Other provinces where killings took place between December 31, 2025, and January 3, 2026, include Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari, Fars, and Kermanshah, each with at least four deaths, as well as Isfahan, Hamedan, and Qom, each with one death.

A protester in Azna, Lorestan province, told Amnesty International that on the evening of January 1, security forces opened fire on peaceful protesters near the county governor’s office in Azadegan Square. She shared a video, which the organizations verified, showing an IRGC agent firing at protesters. After the crowd dispersed, some protesters regrouped outside a nearby police station, where security forces opened fire again.

Verified videos published online on January 1 show protesters outside the station chanting. The sounds of gunshots can be heard in at least one verified video.

Information reviewed indicates that at least six protesters were killed in Azna, including Vahab Mousavi, Mostafa Falahi, Shayan Asadollahi, Ahmadreza Amani, and Reza Moradi Abdolvand. The authorities continue to withhold the body of Taha Safari, 16, who was initially reported as missing. An informed source told Amnesty International that on January 3, Safari’s family members went to a police station to inquire about his whereabouts and an official there showed them pictures of several deceased individuals; the family identified Safari among them. The image of his body showed visible severe head injuries. 

A protester in Malekshahi, Ilam province, told Amnesty International that on the afternoon of January 3, hundreds of peaceful protesters marched from Shohada Square toward an IRGC Basij base:

IRGC agents opened fire from inside the base, shooting … without regard for who they shot … Three to four people were killed instantly, and many others were injured. The protesters were completely unarmed.

Two verified videos from Malekshahi taken in the afternoon show protesters outside the Basij base fleeing amid the sound of gunshots. Another video posted online shows six agents inside the base, with at least one firing a weapon toward protesters. Three victims with visible injuries, motionless, are seen in two videos.

Informed sources said that three protesters—Reza Azimzadeh, Latif Karimi, and Mehdi Emamipour—were killed instantly. Two others, Fares (Mohsen) Agha Mohammadi and Mohammad Reza Karami, died later from their injuries.

In Jafarabad area in Kermanshah, Kermanshah province, Reza Ghanbary and two brothers, Rasoul and Reza Kadivarian, were fatally shot on January 3. A human rights defender said that plainclothes agents, who arrived in three white vehicles, fired metal pellets at the brothers who were among a group of protesters trying to block a road.

In Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari province, security forces killed Ahmad Jalil and Sajad Valamanesh during protests in Lordegan on January 1 and Soroush Soleimani in Hafshejan on January 3, according to information received from a human rights defender. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch reviewed images of their bodies, showing classic spray patterns of metal pellet wounds on their torsos.

Protesters Gravely Injured 

The organizations documented large-scale harm from the widespread use of metal pellets fired from shotguns, including head and eye injuries, as well as injuries caused by beatings and gunfire from rifles.

A protester from Dehdasht, Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province, said that security forces shot him during protests on January 3. Fearing arrest, he avoided hospital care despite risk of losing his leg. An independent pathologist consulted by Amnesty International who reviewed a photograph of the protester’s injury noted that it could have been caused by a single shotgun pellet wound.  

On January 6, a photographer from Ilam city posted a video on social media showing his bloodied face covered with wounds from metal pellets. Showing a metal pellet to the camera, he said that security forces are using hunting ammunition against protesters: “Killing a human is a game to them. They think we are prey and they are hunters.”

A woman in Isfahan city told Amnesty International that an agent pushed her on the ground and stomped on her back as she was fleeing from security forces who were violently dispersing protests. She shared images showing her bloodied face with multiple abrasions. 

“The more I struggled, the harder he pressed down,” she said. “I couldn’t move. I cried out but he told me to shut up.”

The organizations found that the presence of security forces at hospitals has deterred many injured protesters from seeking medical care, increasing the risk of death. According to a human rights defender, Mohsen Armak died in Hafshejan, Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari province, when he was taken to a livestock farm instead of a hospital after being wounded with a metal pellet on January 3.

On January 4, the Special Forces of FARAJA and IRGC attacked Imam Khomeini Hospital in Ilam, where injured protesters were being treated. According to a human rights defender and verified video footage, agents fired shotguns loaded with metal pellets and tear gas into the hospital grounds, smashed glass doors, and beat patients, their relatives, and medical workers.

Mass Arbitrary Arrests

Security forces have arbitrarily arrested hundreds of protesters, including children as young as 14, during protest dispersals and nightly raids on homes. Some were taken from hospitals.

The authorities subjected many to enforced disappearance and incommunicado detention, placing them at risk of torture and other ill-treatment.

The authorities have already broadcast coerced “confessions” of detainees. On January 5, Tasnim News, affiliated with the IRGC, aired “confessions” of an 18-year-old woman and 16-year-old girl, accusing them of “leading riots.”

The Iranian authorities should immediately and unconditionally release anyone detained solely for peacefully taking part in or expressing support for demonstrations. All detainees should be protected from torture and other ill-treatment and immediately granted access to their families, lawyers, and any medical care they need.

Click to expand Image Ugandan human rights activist and executive director of the Centre for Constitutional Governance (CCG), Sarah Bireete, stands in the dock at the Chief Magistrates’ court in Kampala, Uganda, January 2, 2026. © 2026 Abubaker Lubowa/Reuters

On December 30, 2025, two weeks before Uganda’s January 15, 2026 elections, security forces raided the home of Sarah Bireete, a prominent human rights activist and government critic, and arrested her.

Three days later, longer than the legally allowed 48 hours, Bireete was brought before the chief magistrates’ court in Kampala and charged with “unlawfully obtaining or disclosing personal data.” The authorities claimed she had unlawfully obtained or disclosed “national voters information” without the consent of the Electoral Commission but provided no further details.

Bireete’s lawyers told Human Rights Watch that during that time, police interrogated her about her social media posts critical of the government and Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni, who is running for a seventh five-year term in the elections. Her bail hearing was set for January 21, meaning she will remain in detention at least until after the elections, even though Ugandan law requires bail to be determined “expeditiously.”

Bireete is the director of the Center for Constitutional Governance, a human rights organization in Kampala, and is a frequent commentator and government critic in local media and on the internet. She has also raised concerns about the legitimacy of the forthcoming elections in numerous online posts, including concerns about discrepancies in the voters’ registry.

It is not the first time Ugandan authorities have arbitrarily arrested high profile government critics to silence them and others in the lead up to elections. For example, on December 22, 2020, in the lead up to the 2021 elections, police arbitrarily arrested human rights lawyer Nicholas Opiyo, and three other lawyers at a restaurant in Kampala. The authorities charged Opiyo with money laundering, but later withdrew the charges.

Sarah Bireete’s arrest is a demonstration of the Uganda government’s continuing intolerance of dissent. The Ugandan authorities should release Bireete, drop all charges against her, and respect the rights to freedom of expression and political participation.

Click to expand Image Rohingya walk through rice fields after fleeing across the border from Myanmar to Bangladesh near Teknaf, September 1, 2017. © 2017 AP Photo/Bernat Armangue

(The Hague) – International Court of Justice (ICJ) hearings in the Myanmar genocide case highlight the need for justice for the ethnic Rohingya, Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK, Global Justice Center, Human Rights Watch, Refugee Women for Peace and Justice, and Women’s Peace Network said today. Hearings on the merits of the case begin on January 12, 2026.

In August 2017, Myanmar security forces began a sweeping campaign of massacres, rape, and arson against Rohingya in northern Rakhine State that forced more than 700,000 people to flee to neighboring Bangladesh. In November 2019, Gambia filed a case before the ICJ alleging that Myanmar’s atrocities against the Rohingya constitute genocide and violate the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. This is not a criminal case against individuals, but a request for a legal determination of Myanmar’s state responsibility for genocide.

“Seeing Gambia’s landmark case against Myanmar finally enter the merits phase delivers renewed hope to Rohingya that our decades-long suffering may finally end,” said Wai Wai Nu, founder and executive director of the Women’s Peace Network. “Amid ongoing violations against the Rohingya, the world must stand firm in the pursuit of justice and a path toward ending impunity in Myanmar and restoring our rights.”

In December 2019, the ICJ held hearings on Gambia’s request for provisional measures to protect the Rohingya remaining in Myanmar from genocide, which the court unanimously adopted in January 2020. The court’s provisional measures require Myanmar to prevent all genocidal acts against the Rohingya, to ensure that security forces do not commit acts of genocide, and to take steps to preserve evidence related to the case. Myanmar is legally bound to comply. Human Rights Watch and others have documented ongoing grave abuses against the Rohingya remaining in Myanmar, contravening the court-ordered provisional measures.

On February 1, 2021, Myanmar’s military staged a coup, overthrew the democratically elected government, and installed a military junta. Since the coup, armed conflict between Myanmar’s security forces and opposition forces and ethnic armed groups has engulfed much of the country, with security forces committing grave abuses, including airstrikes against civilians in multiple ethnic areas.

The Myanmar military has long subjected Rohingya to atrocity crimes, including the ongoing crimes against humanity of apartheid, persecution, and deprivation of liberty. Since late 2023, Rohingya civilians have been caught in the fighting between the junta and ethnic Arakan Army armed group. Both sides have carried out grave abuses, including extrajudicial killings, widespread arson, and unlawful recruitment.

“The Myanmar military’s vicious cycles of abuses and impunity need to end,” said Shayna Bauchner, Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “This should begin with governments holding the junta to its legal obligation to comply with the ICJ-ordered provisional measures.”

In January 2021, Aung San Suu Kyi’s ruling National League for Democracy government filed preliminary objections challenging the ICJ’s jurisdiction and Gambia’s standing to file the case. In February 2022, the ICJ heard Myanmar’s objections from the military junta. In July, the court rejected the objections, allowing the case to proceed on the merits.

Establishing that genocide has taken place under the Genocide Convention requires demonstrating that genocidal acts were committed with an intent to destroy a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group in whole or in part.

During the three-week hearings at the ICJ, the parties are expected to present their arguments and supporting evidence about whether Myanmar violated the Genocide Convention.

Eleven countries intervened in the case but will not present orally at the hearings on the merits. While their written submissions remain confidential, their declarations of intervention outline several arguments in support of Gambia’s position, including on the issue of genocidal intent, the scope of the obligation to prevent and punish genocide, and the role of sexual and gender-based violence for a genocide determination. The latter is detailed in a paper being published by the Global Justice Center.

“Genocide does not unfold only through mass killing,” said Elise Keppler, executive director of the Global Justice Center. “In Myanmar, targeted sexual and reproductive violence inflicted on Rohingya women and girls was designed to break families, threaten futures, and eliminate the possibility of survival as a group. A gender-competent analysis makes this intent visible – and without it, the case that genocide against the Rohingya occurred is incomplete.”

In addition to Gambia’s ICJ case, there are several ongoing efforts to bring individual perpetrators of crimes in Myanmar to justice.

In 2019, the International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor opened an investigation into alleged grave crimes against the Rohingya. Although Myanmar is not a member of the ICC, the court’s judges have determined that the ICC has jurisdiction over the situation because at least one element of the alleged crimes took place in Bangladesh, an ICC member. In November 2024, the ICC prosecutor requested an arrest warrant for Min Aung Hlaing, commander-in-chief of Myanmar’s military, alleging his responsibility for the crimes against humanity of deportation and persecution of the Rohingya in 2017.

To bring comprehensive accountability, the United Nations Security Council should expand the ICC’s jurisdiction to address the full scope of criminality by referring the situation in Myanmar to the court, the groups said.

In November 2019, a group of human rights organizations, including the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK, filed a criminal case in Argentina under the principle of universal jurisdiction against Myanmar authorities for crimes committed in Rakhine State. In February 2025, an Argentine court issued arrest warrants for 25 individuals from Myanmar, including Min Aung Hlaing.

“To fully address the scale of the crimes against the Rohingya, it is key to seek justice and accountability through different avenues,” said Tun Khin, president of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK. “This case and the pursuit of justice are not only about accountability for past atrocities, but about preventing future ones.”

Gambia’s filing in 2019 was the first time that a country without any direct connection to the alleged crimes used its membership in the Genocide Convention to bring a case before the ICJ.

In December 2023, South Africa filed a case with the ICJ alleging that Israel violated the Genocide Convention by committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza and by failing to prevent it, including by not holding senior Israeli officials and others accountable for their direct and public incitement to genocide. In January, March, and May 2024, the court issued provisional measures, but Israel has flouted the court’s orders to open the crossings into Gaza and allow sufficient humanitarian aid in.

“Myanmar’s case before the ICJ is a beacon of hope for hundreds of thousands of people like myself that our plight for justice will not go unheard,” said Lucky Karim, founder and executive director of Refugee Women for Peace and Justice. “This and other cases before the ICJ are powerful warnings to abusive states across the world that one day, they too may be called to respond for their actions before a court of law.”

Click to expand Image EU Council President Antonio Costa (L) and Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa in Cairo, Egypt, March 4, 2025. © 2025 EU Council/Anadolu via Getty Images

On January 9, the European Union’s highest-level leaders, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and EU Council President Antonio Costa, are set to meet with Syrian leaders in Damascus for their first-ever visit to the country. Von der Leyen and Costa should use this significant moment to press for a rights-respecting transition in Syria. 

High on the agenda for both parties is Syria’s economic recovery. While the EU’s lifting of all sanctions on Syria in May 2025 was an important step to enabling reconstruction and recovery, Syrian authorities are also counting on European support to rebuild an economy decimated by years of conflict and crushing sanctions. But prior experience shows committing to provide financial support for reconstruction without tying such support to respect for human rights and nondiscrimination creates serious risk of corruption and other harms that exacerbate economic strife. EU leaders should make clear that EU support is tied to upholding human rights obligations, including through zero tolerance of and effective safeguards against rights abuses.

Since the fall of the Assad government in December 2024, the EU has rightly reiterated its long-standing commitment to the human rights of all Syrians. In the last year, Syrian transitional authorities and affiliated forces have committed grave atrocities against Syrian minority communities in Sweida and the country’s coastal areas. These abuses highlight the EU’s need to press for genuine reform of Syria’s security sector as part of its transitional justice process. 

As key supporters of accountability for Syria in the last decade, the EU should stress the importance of independent and impartial accountability for Syrian victims and survivors of international crimes committed by all perpetrators during and after the Syrian conflict. 

Finally, EU leaders should refrain from making concessions that downplay Syria’s continued economic, security, and rights challenges to justify or facilitate the premature return of Syrians. 

After decades of abuse and conflict, Syrians deserve more from EU leaders than just words. Instead, the EU should provide genuine support to a successful Syrian-led transition rooted in guarantees of transitional authorities’ respect for the rights for all Syrians.

Click to expand Image A police patrol vehicle outside the United Nations compound in Sanaa, Yemen, following reports of UN staff being detained by the Houthis, October 29, 2025. © 2025 Khaled Abdullah/Reuters Houthi authorities have arbitrarily detained at least 69 UN staff and dozens of civil society staff over the last 18 months and have not provided them with due process.The Houthis’ stepped-up detentions of civil society and UN agency members risk increasing the humanitarian aid crisis in Yemen, already one of the worst situations in the world.It is imperative for the UN, independent groups working in Yemen, and concerned governments to take every action in their power to ensure the release of those detained.

(Beirut) – The Houthis’ stepped-up detentions of civil society and United Nations agency members has contributed to increasing the humanitarian aid crisis in Yemen, already one of the worst situations in the world, Human Rights Watch said today.

As of January 4, 2026, at least 69 UN staff, all Yemeni nationals, have been arbitrarily detained, along with dozens of Yemeni staff of international and local nongovernmental organizations, with many facing baseless accusations of espionage. In recent months, the Houthis also raided the UN Common Accommodation Facility in Sanaa, and the offices of several UN agencies, international nongovernmental organizations, and local civil society organizations, in some cases taking their equipment.

“The Houthis are detaining aid workers who are providing lifesaving support to the Yemeni people while failing to provide for the basic needs of those living in their territories,” said Niku Jafarnia, Yemen and Bahrain researcher at Human Rights Watch. “They should immediately release the dozens of people they have arbitrarily detained and end their continued obstruction of aid delivery.”

The Houthis’ detentions of UN and civil society staff is occurring while hunger levels are worsening in Yemen. In their latest global report on hunger, the World Food Programme (WFP) and UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) warned: “The already critical acute food insecurity situation is expected to deteriorate further over the outlook period [November 2025 to May 2026], with pockets of the population projected to face Catastrophe” in four districts under Houthi control.

Human Rights Watch spoke to 36 people, including family and friends of those detained, aid workers, diplomats, and lawyers and activists familiar with the cases. Human Rights Watch also reviewed social media posts by several detainees’ family members regarding their loved ones. 

Several sources said that the Houthis’ actions had meant that the UN could not carry out their work in full due to the risks their staff face in Houthi-controlled territories. They said UN staff could not go into their offices or move around freely for fear of being arrested, affecting their ability to provide aid.

In many cases, Yemenis working for the UN, international groups, civil society, and diplomatic missions have fled Houthi-controlled territories to areas of southern Yemen or abroad as a result of the Houthis’ wide-sweeping arrest campaign. 

In July 2024, prior to the UN suspension of activities in one region and the US designation of the Houthis as a terrorist organization, 15 UN and other aid groups were operating across 14 districts in the governorate, with 26 programs working on food security and nutrition, water and sanitation, health, and shelter. In July 2025, there were just two organizations working in three districts of the governorate on health and nutrition.

In November 2022, the last time the Integrated Phase Classification (IPC, the world’s foremost experts on food insecurity) reported on Houthi-controlled territories prior to 2025, the IPC projected that 63 percent of the population of Saada was in the crisis levels of food insecurity or above, with the vast majority of those in need classified as being in IPC Phase 3 (crisis level). In June 2025, the IPC’s map of Saada had been inverted: the majority of the population was projected to be in IPC Phase 4 (emergency), with a smaller portion in IPC Phase 3. 

The Houthis’ arrests have negatively affected the ability of aid organizations to provide aid to people in Houthi-controlled territories, despite the severe and increasing needs. 

In October, Abdulwahid Abu Ras, the Houthis’ acting foreign minister, told Reuters that the Houthis support humanitarian provision, and will “assist organizations committed to the principles of humanitarian work, facilitating their activities and work.” 

Most sources working at aid organizations have contradicted that statement, saying that the arrest campaign and the raids have severely impacted their ability to work. 

Furthermore, the Houthis have occupied UN agency offices, as well as the UN Common Accommodation Facility in Sanaa (UNCAF), the residential compound where many international UN staff were living. They have taken equipment, including laptops, routers, and other devices from UN agencies as well as nongovernmental organizations, crippling their ability to communicate and access data and information required for carrying out their operations.

One person interviewed said that “[the Houthis] occupied the offices of the two biggest UN agencies. They’ve taken vehicles from some agencies. They’ve confiscated [technological] equipment.… So just as a pure result of what they’ve done so far, the direct consequences of the Houthis’ activities have essentially paralyzed humanitarian operations.”

An aid worker said, “I cannot ask colleagues for any form of data for reporting. You suddenly wake up in the morning and you don’t have an office, don’t have equipment, you don’t have a team.”

An aid worker who was displaced from Sanaa due to the risks the Houthis have imposed on civil society said: “In the middle of the night, I packed my entire life into two bags and cried.… I still remember my friends, my people locked away for doing their job. My beloved country is in ruins.”

Several sources said that the Houthis have required many employees of the UN who stayed behind in Houthi-controlled territories to sign papers stating that they would not leave the area. Some aid agencies that have remained working in the Houthi-controlled territories said that if the arrests and harassment of aid agency staff continued, they would need to reassess whether they could keep operating in the area. 

One person working on health care said: “The situation is already catastrophic. Cholera outbreaks, malnutrition, etc. Without [the organization] and other partners in the health sector, it would be the collapse of the health sector in the north.” Nongovernmental groups and the UN are currently supporting a large number of hospitals and healthcare clinics throughout Houthi-controlled territories.

In a joint statement published in October, over 30 aid organizations in Yemen said that according to research conducted in August 2025, “[o]ver 100 districts in Yemen now face a critical nutrition emergency, an unprecedented increase in malnutrition levels across the country.” They said that in Abs District of Hajjah governorate, “children have died of starvation as malnutrition rates soared, while in Al Hodeida and Taiz, a projected 15-30 percent rise in acute malnutrition is expected by the end of the year.”

The organizations stated that “While conditions are challenging across Yemen, in northern governorates [Houthi-controlled territories], the ongoing detention of humanitarian staff has further obstructed lifesaving aid operations.” 

The Houthis’ actions continue a troubling pattern of repression of civic space in Yemen and a brutal targeting of human rights and humanitarian workers under baseless accusations of espionage. 

It is imperative for the United Nations, independent groups working in Yemen, and concerned governments to take every action in their power to ensure the release of those detained, Human Rights Watch said. Oman, which has been a mediator in negotiations between the Houthis and other warring parties, should work with other countries collectively to ensure that the Houthis release the detainees.

Enforced disappearances, in which the authorities detain a person and then refuse to acknowledge their whereabouts or situation when asked, are serious crimes under international law and are prohibited at all times under both international human rights law and international humanitarian law. 

Arresting a person without a warrant and clear charges is a violation under Article 132 of the Yemeni Criminal Procedures Law. 

“By targeting aid workers, the Houthis are also targeting the many Yemenis who depend on the aid they provide,” said Jafarnia. “The international community, particularly governments in the region, should do everything in their power to ensure the dozens of arbitrarily detained UN and civil society staff are immediately released.”

Detentions of Aid Agency Workers

Starting on May 31, 2024, Houthi security forces arrested and forcibly disappeared several staff of Yemeni civil society organizations. Then on June 6, they arrested dozens of people, including at least 13 UN staff and many employees of nongovernmental organizations.

The Houthis then detained at least eight UN staff members between January 23 and 25, 2025. This new wave of arrests came after US president Donald Trump redesignated the Houthis as a “foreign terrorist organization” through an executive order on January 22, 2025, over its actions firing at US warships in the Red Sea. One of the UN staff members detained in January, a World Food Program employee, died in Houthi custody on February 11. 

Because of these arrests and the continuing risks to its staff, the UN suspended its activities in Saada, a governorate in northern Yemen, where thousands of people are facing emergency levels of food insecurity and were relying on UN aid to survive.

On August 31, the Houthis began its most recent wave of arrests and raids on UN and international nongovernmental agency offices. Houthi forces raided several UN offices and detained at least 19 UN staff. In addition to those arrested, many UN staff were held and interrogated for several days within UN offices. 

Between September and December, the Houthis continued arresting UN staff, raiding several UN offices and the UN compound in Sanaa, confiscating devices and holding some staff there in arbitrary detention for several days for questioning. In November the Houthis also raided the offices of all international groups operating in Houthi-controlled territories, including Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors without Borders, MSF) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

Another round of arrests began three days after the Israeli military carried out attacks on Sanaa, the capital, which killed the Houthis’ prime minister, Ahmed al-Rahawi, and several other government ministers. 

On November 10, the Houthis also raided the office of Dal Center for Social Studies, a civil society organization in Sanaa, and detained Professor Hammoud al-Awdi, a sociologist at Sanaa University and a leader in Yemen’s civil society, along with two of his colleagues, Abdulrahman al-Alfi and Anwar Khaled Shaab. After three weeks being held incommunicado, al-Awdi and al-Alfi were released, but Shaab still remains in detention. 

Human Rights Watch found many individuals were arrested without being shown arrest warrants and were forcibly disappeared for months. While some have received medical care, many have not, including some detainees who have serious medical conditions. 

No sources that Human Rights Watch spoke to were aware of any detainees having access to lawyers.

In November, the Houthi’s Specialized Criminal Court conducted unfair trials for 21 detainees—unrelated to the detained UN and civil society staff—and sentenced 17 to death. Many were charged with espionage without clear basis and without adequate access to due process.

The next month, the Houthis transferred the cases of 13 more detainees to the Specialized Criminal Court, including three UN employees.

Compounded Aid Crisis, Worsening Hunger

The Houthis’ arrests have coincided, and in some cases possibly responded to, the US designation of the Houthis as a foreign terrorist organization, which led to several aid organizations being forced to cut their operations in Houthi-controlled territory. The arrests have also coincided with US cuts to foreign aid, which, alongside the foreign terrorist designation, have contributed in some cases to the decision of other states to also pull out or cut back on financing aid in Yemen. All together, these actions have had a devastating impact on aid in the country despite the severe and growing needs. 

Several sources across the humanitarian aid sector in Yemen said that the arrests, the FTO designation, and cuts to aid have together forced them to cut back on operations in Yemen, especially in Houthi-controlled territory, which has meant cutting some essential health programs, water and sanitation programs, and food aid. 

One source said that the organization they work with was “forced to close operations in the north [Houthi-controlled territory] and relocate to the south,” as a result of the funding gaps and the terrorist designation, in addition to the Houthis’ detention of UN and civil society staff. 

In their November 2025 report, the WFP and FAO found that Yemen’s crisis of food insecurity is expected to worsen in the coming months. They stated that the factors contributing to the deepening hunger crisis includes: “economic deterioration, escalating conflict, economic sanctions, adverse weather conditions, population displacement and disrupted supply chains that restrict market access, amid extreme humanitarian access constraints and the collapse of safety nets.”

Targeting Aid Workers

Many of those detained had been providing humanitarian aid, or supporting Yemen’s health and education sectors, and their detentions have meant lost capacity for the provision of aid in Yemen. 

Ammar Nasser had worked with WFP in Gaza from March to July 2025, prior to going back to Yemen to work for WFP in Sanaa as a safety and security officer. He was arbitrarily detained on August 31, as one of 15 UN employees who were arrested when the Houthis raided WFP and UNICEF offices in Sanaa and Hodeidah. In a televised speech, Abdulmalek al-Houthi, the Houthi leader, specifically accused the WFP, including the safety and security officer, of having had a role in Israeli forces’ attack on several Houthi ministers on August 28. 

Hind Khoudary, a prominent Palestinian journalist in Gaza, told Human Rights Watch that she worked with Nasser at WFP for several months in Gaza and was displaced with him. In a social media post, she said:

Ammar is a true humanitarian who worked day and night to make sure people in Gaza received the food they needed. When he wasn’t working, he was caring for people, laughing with children, and sharing stories of his love for Yemen and Palestine. Everyone who met him in Gaza remembers his kindness, dedication and loyalty to the Palestinian people. Today, he’s being punished for his humanity. The only “proof” against him is that he served the people of Gaza with honor and compassion.

One of the detainees, a public health expert, had spent over two decades implementing projects and developing policies focused on improving health in Yemen and across the Middle East and North Africa region. He was arrested by Houthi forces on June 8, 2024, and these forces subsequently disappeared him for seven months. Since then, his wife has only had a handful of phone calls with him, each just lasting a few minutes. He has not received health care or medicine, despite suffering from glaucoma, nor has he had access to a lawyer. His wife said:

[My husband] worked on strengthening the public health programs in Yemen since the early 2000’s until he was detained. All of these projects were approved by the Houthis’ Ministry of Health. None of the projects were a secret. Every project was under their supervision. Saving children's lives has now become a crime.

Another one of the detainees had been working for several nongovernmental organizations as a consultant and was also arrested and disappeared from his home on June 8, 2024. His son, said that his father had worked on “education, women's rights, [and] children’s rights. All the programs that are advocating for people’s rights.” He said that his father’s work included “giving salaries to teachers who hadn’t had salaries since the war started.” 

The son of another detainee said that his father had worked with the UN because “he felt he was doing something good [for his country], and really enjoyed what he was doing, even though it wasn’t easy.” He said that even though his father had been offered job opportunities outside of Yemen, he’d never taken them as he had wanted to stay in his homeland. 

A History of Obstructing Humanitarian Aid

Human Rights Watch and other organizations have documented that the Houthis have obstructed humanitarian aid for several years, despite ongoing catastrophic health crises. 

International and local nongovernmental organizations require approval by Houthi authorities for everything from workshops they plan to hold to the movement of their staff to implement projects that the Houthis have already approved. 

“We try to be super forward with authorities about everything we do, very transparent. We apply for permits for everything. Our work in the north is hampered by this and the mahram restrictions [the restrictions on women’s freedom of movement],” said one individual working in humanitarian aid. Several other sources from a variety of organizations provided similar accounts. 

“Our colleague … was fully in touch with the authorities and shared everything with them, they would always ask for permission for everything they did,” said a UN staff member about their detained colleague.

Over the years, several sources have told Human Rights Watch that the Houthis have interfered in hiring processes and program bids, have manipulated beneficiary lists, and have blocked and restricted the implementation of essential operations such as out needs assessments. 

Most recently, in October 2025, Reuters found that the Houthis have “used international food aid to force parents to hand over children to be soldiers in its armed forces,” based on “interviews with hundreds of Yemenis” who had fled Houthi-controlled areas. The news agency also stated that based on “[i]nterviews with Yemeni civilians and dozens of aid workers, as well as a review of internal UN aid agency documents, reveal … [the Houthis] levy an array of taxes on their impoverished subjects, manipulate the international aid system and imprison hundreds.” 

Human Rights Watch research confirms this practice. 

The WFP has partially suspended its aid in Yemen twice over the last six years. In 2019, they explicitly stated that the aid paused was due to aid diversion. David Beasley, the head of WFP at the time, told the UN Security Council that the Houthis were diverting food aid away “from the mouths of hungry little boys and little girls,” and that Houthi authorities were not respecting the agreements they had made with the UN. 

In 2023, the WFP again paused aid, stating it was a result of limited funding and an inability to come to an agreement with the Houthis “on a smaller program that matches available resources to the neediest families.” Several sources have told Human Rights Watch that the pullout was linked with disagreements over beneficiary lists and the Houthis’ continued use of aid to recruit fighters to their forces. 

Baseless Accusations of Espionage

The arrests have been accompanied by an ongoing Houthi-led media campaign accusing humanitarian organizations and their staff of “conspiring” against the country’s interests through their projects. Following the first wave of arrests, on June 10, 2024, the Houthi Security and Intelligence Service announced the “discovery” of what they called “a spying network.” Two days later, Al Masirah TV, a Houthi-affiliated channel, broadcast a video featuring a different group of detainees “confessing” to spying. The group had been detained between 2021 and 2023 and held incommunicado since then.

In August 2024, the Houthi-run Supreme Council for Management and Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and International Cooperation reiterated the Houthis’ restrictive policies on humanitarian activities in five-day long meetings with the staff of UN and other international groups’ staff, warning them “of the dangers of espionage that may be exploited within the framework of humanitarian work.”

The so-called evidence shown in the videos accusing them of being spies included letters of recommendation from their current or former employers, including the US embassy in Yemen, citing the projects they had worked on, and recommending them for future employment and visas. Human Rights Watch could not confirm the veracity of the documents, but they do not appear to contain evidence of espionage.

In a statement on June 14, 2024, Human Rights Commissioner Volker Türk stressed that “the public broadcasting on 10 and 12 June of statements procured under circumstances of inherent duress from our colleague, detained incommunicado, and others detained since 2021 is totally unacceptable, and itself violates their human rights.”

Two sources told Human Rights Watch that families of some detainees have been told that their detained family member may have also been forced by authorities to confess in a video, despite not having had any access to lawyers. The Houthis have also released videos of other detainees confessing to espionage and other charges, suggesting that the practice of forced confessions is continuing.

Human Rights Watch and other groups, including the former UN Group of Eminent Experts on Yemen, have documented the Houthis’ use of torture to obtain information or confessions. In their 2020 report, the experts said that they had “verified that 14 men and 1 boy had been subjected to torture, including sexual violence in eight cases, to extract written confessions or punish them while levelling accusations of affiliations to different political and military groups.”

Houthis have used Israeli forces’ attacks to try to further justify the arrests and accusations of espionage, as well as their escalating their repression of Yemenis living in areas under their control.

On October 16, Abdulmalek al-Houthi, the Houthis’ leader, claimed in a televised statement that the UN and international organizations were engaged in espionage and carrying out surveillance and intelligence activities. In particular, he alleged that “a cell affiliated with the UN’s World Food Program played a key role in Israeli forces’ targeting and killing of several Houthi ministers.” He added that “these organizations had been supplied with surveillance equipment and capabilities typically used by global intelligence agencies.”

Nasruddin Amer, a senior Houthi official, published a tweet on his X account stating that “(...) organizations operate ostensibly under the banner of relief and humanitarian work, while in reality they are organizations of a military and intelligence nature.

Houthi authorities have not publicly provided clear evidence to back these claims, and as far as sources who spoke to Human Rights Watch are aware, they have not formally charged or provided due process to those WFP employees or any other UN employees they have detained to dispute these accusations.

Al Masirah TV has been airing videos and media pieces accusing the UN and international groups of espionage and portraying their staff as spies. 

Since 2015, several human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, and the Gulf Center for Human Rights have altogether documented dozens of cases involving journalists, human rights defenders, political opponents and members of religious minorities who had been subjected to unfair trials before Houthi-controlled courts on abusive charges. In all these cases, the Houthis’ prosecution authorities appeared to have brought the spying charges in order to persecute political opponents and silence peaceful dissent.

Notably, on June 1, 2024, the Specialized Criminal Court (SCC) sentenced 44 people to death on trumped up spying charges following an unfair mass trial. Sixteen were sentenced in absentia while 28 were brought before the SCC.

Click to expand Image Demonstrators hold a banner during a protest against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts (PCSC) bill on January 15, 2022 in London, UK.  © 2022 Rasid Necati Aslim/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images UK authorities have severely restricted the right to protest, in contravention of their international human rights obligations.The Labour government, instead of curbing repressive measures against protesters in previous legislation under the Conservative government, is in the process of expanding them.The UK government should repeal anti-democratic protest restrictions and review and publicly account for all protest arrests and convictions made under laws that courts have ruled unlawful.

(London, January 8, 2026) – UK authorities have severely restricted the right to protest, in contravention of their international human rights obligations, creating an environment in which peaceful dissent is increasingly treated as a criminal act, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today.

The 47-page report, “‘Silencing the Streets’: The Right to Protest Under Attack in the UK,” documents that the UK’s Labour government has failed to reverse sweeping anti-protest laws introduced by the previous Conservative government. Instead, Labour has attempted to expand them with the Crime and Policing Bill 2025 and through the unprecedented misuse of terrorism legislation to target and criminalize peaceful protest. The Crime and Policing bill, pending before parliament, is to be debated in the House of Lords in January 2026.

January 7, 2026 Silencing the Streets

The Right to Protest Under Attack in the United Kingdom

Download the full report in English

“The UK is now adopting protest-control tactics imposed in countries where democratic safeguards are collapsing,” said Lydia Gall, senior Europe and Central Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The UK should oppose such measures, not replicate and endorse them.”

The Labour government has taken a deeply alarming direction on protest rights and appears to be determined to suppress these rights further instead of requiring government accountability for policing, Human Rights Watch said. 

Recent protest restrictions result from a combination of vague statutory provisions and broad police discretion, creating a legal environment in which the authorities can curtail demonstrations with limited oversight. The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 (PCSCA 2022) and the Public Order Act 2023 (POA 2023) broaden police discretion to impose conditions on protesters, make pre-emptive arrests, and pursue prison sentences for nonviolent protest activity, which in the past typically resulted in fines or community service. 

The report, based on research in 2024 and 2025, shows that protesters are increasingly detained, charged, and in some cases sentenced to multi-year prison terms for non-violent actions such as attending planning meetings. The inconsistent and sometimes arbitrary enforcement of these provisions contributes to confusion and has a chilling effect on dissent.

A striking example of overreach is the case of a retired social worker, Trudi Warner, arrested and charged with contempt of court for quietly holding a sign outside a courthouse informing jurors of their rights. The High Court dismissed the case as “fanciful” and confirmed that she had not attempted to influence any juror. Despite this, the Labour government initially filed an appeal before abandoning the case.

A stark illustration of the escalating crackdown on peaceful protest is the case of five Just Stop Oil activists who, in July 2024, were sentenced to between two and five years in prison for merely joining a Zoom call to plan a protest.

On appeal, the High Court ruled in March 2025 that the sentences were “manifestly excessive” and disproportionate to the nonviolent conduct involved. Nevertheless, the court only reduced the activists’ prison sentences marginally, in one instance from five to four years. 

Such cases raise serious concerns for democratic accountability, as the expansion of state authority risks suppressing public participation and weakening the ability of people to hold the government to account.

The new Crime and Policing Bill 2025 would deepen the crackdown on protest by expanding police powers to ban face coverings by protesters, restrict demonstrations near places of worship, and impose conditions that could put people with insecure immigration status, such as asylum seekers and undocumented persons, at risk of deportation. Domestic and international human rights bodies have warned that such restrictions are vague, disproportionate, and unnecessary.

The UK remains legally obliged to protect freedom of expression and peaceful assembly under both domestic and international law, including the Human Rights Act 1998, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (articles 19 and 21), and the European Convention on Human Rights (articles 10 and 11).

The government should repeal or amend the PCSCA 2022 and POA 2023 to remove unnecessary restrictions on protests, strengthen the Human Rights Act to prevent political interference with protests, and stop using counterterrorism legislation against protesters, Human Rights Watch said.

The UK government should also establish a substantial public inquiry into the policing of protests under the PCSCA 2022 and POA 2023 and ensure that policing of protests complies with international human rights law.

“The UK should be protecting the right to protest instead of stripping away people’s rights,” Gall said. “Lawmakers should revise the new law to remove measures that would further restrict the right to protest.”

Click to expand Image Demonstrators hold a banner during a protest against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts (PCSC) bill on January 15, 2022 in London, UK.  © 2022 Rasid Necati Aslim/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images UK authorities have severely restricted the right to protest, in contravention of their international human rights obligations.The Labour government, instead of curbing repressive measures against protesters in previous legislation under the Conservative government, is in the process of expanding them.The UK government should repeal anti-democratic protest restrictions and review and publicly account for all protest arrests and convictions made under laws that courts have ruled unlawful.

(London, January 8, 2026) – UK authorities have severely restricted the right to protest, in contravention of their international human rights obligations, creating an environment in which peaceful dissent is increasingly treated as a criminal act, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today.

The 47-page report, “‘Silencing the Streets’: The Right to Protest Under Attack in the UK,” documents that the UK’s Labour government has failed to reverse sweeping anti-protest laws introduced by the previous Conservative government. Instead, Labour has attempted to expand them with the Crime and Policing Bill 2025 and through the unprecedented misuse of terrorism legislation to target and criminalize peaceful protest. The Crime and Policing bill, pending before parliament, is to be debated in the House of Lords in January 2026.

January 7, 2026 Silencing the Streets

The Right to Protest Under Attack in the United Kingdom

Download the full report in English

“The UK is now adopting protest-control tactics imposed in countries where democratic safeguards are collapsing,” said Lydia Gall, senior Europe and Central Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The UK should oppose such measures, not replicate and endorse them.”

The Labour government has taken a deeply alarming direction on protest rights and appears to be determined to suppress these rights further instead of requiring government accountability for policing, Human Rights Watch said. 

Recent protest restrictions result from a combination of vague statutory provisions and broad police discretion, creating a legal environment in which the authorities can curtail demonstrations with limited oversight. The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 (PCSCA 2022) and the Public Order Act 2023 (POA 2023) broaden police discretion to impose conditions on protesters, make pre-emptive arrests, and pursue prison sentences for nonviolent protest activity, which in the past typically resulted in fines or community service. 

The report, based on research in 2024 and 2025, shows that protesters are increasingly detained, charged, and in some cases sentenced to multi-year prison terms for non-violent actions such as attending planning meetings. The inconsistent and sometimes arbitrary enforcement of these provisions contributes to confusion and has a chilling effect on dissent.

A striking example of overreach is the case of a retired social worker, Trudi Warner, arrested and charged with contempt of court for quietly holding a sign outside a courthouse informing jurors of their rights. The High Court dismissed the case as “fanciful” and confirmed that she had not attempted to influence any juror. Despite this, the Labour government initially filed an appeal before abandoning the case.

A stark illustration of the escalating crackdown on peaceful protest is the case of five Just Stop Oil activists who, in July 2024, were sentenced to between two and five years in prison for merely joining a Zoom call to plan a protest.

On appeal, the High Court ruled in March 2025 that the sentences were “manifestly excessive” and disproportionate to the nonviolent conduct involved. Nevertheless, the court only reduced the activists’ prison sentences marginally, in one instance from five to four years. 

Such cases raise serious concerns for democratic accountability, as the expansion of state authority risks suppressing public participation and weakening the ability of people to hold the government to account.

The new Crime and Policing Bill 2025 would deepen the crackdown on protest by expanding police powers to ban face coverings by protesters, restrict demonstrations near places of worship, and impose conditions that could put people with insecure immigration status, such as asylum seekers and undocumented persons, at risk of deportation. Domestic and international human rights bodies have warned that such restrictions are vague, disproportionate, and unnecessary.

The UK remains legally obliged to protect freedom of expression and peaceful assembly under both domestic and international law, including the Human Rights Act 1998, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (articles 19 and 21), and the European Convention on Human Rights (articles 10 and 11).

The government should repeal or amend the PCSCA 2022 and POA 2023 to remove unnecessary restrictions on protests, strengthen the Human Rights Act to prevent political interference with protests, and stop using counterterrorism legislation against protesters, Human Rights Watch said.

The UK government should also establish a substantial public inquiry into the policing of protests under the PCSCA 2022 and POA 2023 and ensure that policing of protests complies with international human rights law.

“The UK should be protecting the right to protest instead of stripping away people’s rights,” Gall said. “Lawmakers should revise the new law to remove measures that would further restrict the right to protest.”

Smoke rises at La Carlota airport in Caracas, Venezuela on January 3, 2026 following US airstrikes. © 2026 AP Photo/Matias Delacroix

(New York) – The Trump administration’s brazen military assault risks causing a new human rights disaster for Venezuelans, Human Rights Watch said today. 

In the early morning hours of January 3, 2026 the US military conducted strikes on Venezuela and took into custody the country’s president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores. They have since been arraigned before a US federal court on drug trafficking and other criminal charges.  

“Venezuelans are entitled to freely choose their own leaders and decide their nation’s future,” said Juanita Goebertus, Americas director at Human Rights Watch. “However, the US appears poised to actively encourage Venezuela to maintain Maduro’s repressive apparatus as long as it furthers US political and business interests.” 

President Donald Trump said on January 3 that the United States would “run” Venezuela for the time being, without specifying what this means. US officials have indicated that they intend to work with Delcy Rodríguez, who had been serving as Maduro’s vice president and was sworn in as interim president on January 5. 

US authorities said that they will use their ability to tighten or loosen an oil blockade in the Caribbean, along with the threat of further strikes, to compel the Venezuelan government to comply with US demands and expectations. These include paving the way for US oil company investments in the country and addressing gang violence, among other goals. 

The US strikes on January 3 are reported to have targeted military facilities and reportedly killed dozens of military officers and at least two civilians. The Cuban government, which has long supported Venezuela’s government, said that 32 Cuban officers were killed. In the buildup to these strikes, the United States extrajudicially executed at least 115 people in vessels that the Trump administration claims were trafficking illegal narcotics in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean.  

Following the January 3 strikes, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that the United States will press the Venezuelan government to facilitate oil investments by US companies, respond to criminal groups, and sever ties with Iran and Hezbollah. President Trump told reporters on January 5 that if Venezuela does not “behave,” the United States “will do a second strike.” 

Trump has also said the United States would “run” Venezuela until there is a “judicious transition.” The US government has not specified when or how any transition might take place or whether that process would include free and fair elections, the release of political prisoners, and other key human rights changes. 

In July 2024, Venezuelans took to the polls in large numbers despite repression by the Maduro government. Independent observers presented data showing that Venezuelans overwhelmingly supported Edmundo González, who is backed by the opposition leader María Corina Machado, to became president. However, electoral authorities announced that Maduro had been re-elected. 

Following the elections, the Maduro government carried out a wave of widespread human rights violations, including killings of protesters and arbitrary detention and enforced disappearance of opposition leaders, critics, human rights defenders, and foreign nationals. 

Over 860 political prisoners remain behind bars in Venezuela, according to the pro-bono legal group Foro Penal. The Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has an open investigation into alleged crimes against humanity committed in Venezuela since 2014. 

For over a decade, Venezuelans have suffered a humanitarian crisis, with severe shortages of food and medicine. Seven million Venezuelans have fled the country and 14.2 million others have severe humanitarian needs.  

Latin American, European, Canadian, and other world leaders should push for a transition to democracy, call for the release of political prisoners, and promote accountability for serious human rights violations committed by the Venezuelan government, Human Rights Watch said. For its part, the US government should uphold its obligations under international human rights law and international humanitarian law. 

“Foreign governments should focus on protecting the rights of Venezuelans who have suffered for a decade at the hands of the Maduro government,” Goebertus said. “Trump’s decapitation of the Venezuelan government has done nothing to protect them from further abuse.”

Click to expand Image Students on the first day of a new academic year at a public school in Cairo, Egypt, September 21, 2025. © 2025 Ahmed Gomaa/Xinhua via Getty Images

(Beirut) – The Egyptian government has severely undermined the rights to education and health care by failing to allocate sufficient spending, falling short of constitutional obligations and international benchmarks, Human Rights Watch said today. It is failing to ensure free primary education for every child and quality health care accessible to all. 

Inadequate funding has contributed to severe shortages and high costs. Egypt has a shortage of hundreds of thousands of classrooms and teachers while the health care system suffers from low salaries, an inadequate doctor-to-population ratio, and a lack of 75,000 nurses. Families pay school fees and out-of-pocket costs, a majority of health care expenses are paid out of pocket, and doctors are personally paying for essential hospital supplies.

“The Egyptian government has failed for years to adequately ensure the rights of education and health for everyone, as demonstrated by its chronic underfunding,” said Amr Magdi, senior Middle East and North Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The lack of adequate funding for health and education demonstrates the government’s deep indifference toward its citizens’ rights.” 

Human Rights Watch analysis found that, over the past five years, education spending in Egypt has consistently decreased in inflation-adjusted terms and as a percentage of total government expenditure and Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Health care spending has mostly decreased in inflation-adjusted terms but fluctuated as a percentage of total expenditure and GDP.

In fiscal year 2025-26, which began July 1, 2025, the government proposed and parliament approved an education budget of 315 billion Egyptian pounds (about US$6.3 billion), equivalent to 1.5 percent of Egypt’s GDP and about 4.7 percent of government expenditure. Human Rights Watch analysis found that this is the lowest percentage of the budget allocated for education since at least 2019. In inflation-adjusted terms, Human Rights Watch found that spending on education decreased 10 percent from 2024/25 and is 39 percent lower than in 2013/14 or 2014/15, when President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi came to power. 

Egypt’s 2014 Constitution requires the government to spend no less than 6 percent of GDP on education. Prevailing international benchmarks recommend 4 to 6 percent of GDP and at least 15 to 20 percent of public expenditure. Human Rights Watch's calculation for 2025-26 spending as a percent of GDP would place Egypt in the 12th percentile of all lower middle-income countries, spending less than 88 percent of similarly situated countries.

The current year’s health budget of 245 billion pounds (about $4.9 billion) is equivalent to just 1.1 percent of Egypt’s GPD and 3.6 percent of total government expenditure. Human Rights Watch found that the budgets from 2021/22 to 2025/26 fluctuated between 1 and 1.4 percent of GDP, never reaching even half the minimum 3 percent the constitution requires.

After adjusting for inflation, health spending in 2025/26 is only 2 percent higher than the prior year and remains 4 percent lower than in 2022/23. When taking population growth into account, per person spending is flat over the last three years.

Egypt’s health spending is also significantly below international benchmarks. The Abuja Declaration of 2001, which Egypt signed, included a pledge to allocate 15 percent of government expenditure to health. The World Health Organization (WHO) has estimatedthat providing universal health coverage, an important element of the right to health, generally requires governments to spend at least 5 to 6 percent of their GDP on health care, four to five times Egypt’s current allocation. Egypt adopted a landmark Universal Health Insurance Lawin 2018, which aims to achieve full coverage by 2030. 

As in prior years, the government falsely claimed that its 2025/26 budget met constitutional spending minimums for health and education by including extraneous budget lines, such as debt servicing, in its calculations. In 2022, Egypt spent more than twice as much servicing its external public debt per capita than it spent on health care.

Human Rights Watch has previously found that Egypt’s declining funding is severely undermining education, raising significant human rights concerns. The government has acknowledged shortages of hundreds of thousands of teachers and classrooms. Public schools charge nominal fees, waived for some low income students, violating Egypt’s obligation under the constitution and international human rights law to provide free primary education. 

In 2019, families with children in school spent an average of 10.4 percent of their income on school-related costs. Due to the poor quality of chronically underfunded public education, many higher-income parents pay for private lessons and tutoring, worsening wealth-based inequality.

Egypt's underfunded health care system similarly faces significant challenges and the country’s declining trends on several important health care indicators raise significant concerns for the right to health. 

The health care system suffers chronic and severe shortages of resources. Doctors have reported paying out of pocket for essential hospital supplies like gloves and sutures. President Sisi in recent years acknowledged that salaries for doctors at public health care facilities, set by the government, are inadequate to retain qualified staff, citing a lack of resources. 

Low public health care funding contributes to the growing number of nurses and doctors leaving the country, further undermining the availability of health care services. According to the Doctors’ Syndicate, 11,536 doctors resigned from working in the public sector between 2019 and March 2022. Approximately 7,000 Egyptian doctors emigrated to work abroad in 2023 alone. 

Egypt’s doctor-to-population ratio was 6.71 for every 10,000 people in 2020, well below the WHO’s minimum recommendation of 10. An independent 2024 study of Egyptian doctors working abroad found that low remuneration, poor working conditions, and a lack of medical equipment and supplies pushed them to leave. Egypt also has a shortage of 75,000 nurses, according to the head of the Nursing Syndicate. 

The WHO estimated that more than 57 percent of health care expenses in Egypt were paid out of pocket in 2023. Out-of-pocket costs worsen health care inequalities by creating barriers to accessing health care based on the ability to pay. In 2024, President Sisi ratified law 87 on health facilities, which allows private investors to manage and operate public hospitals, a form of privatization, without imposing regulations to ensure universal access to these hospitals, such as by setting price caps. 

Human Rights Watch wrote to the Egyptian ministries of education and health on December 22, 2025, to share its findings but did not receive a response.

The rights to education and health care are enshrined in international law, including in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, all of which Egypt has ratified. 

Egypt has an obligation to take deliberate, concrete, and targeted steps to the maximum of its available resources to fulfil economic, social, and cultural rights. Egypt should guarantee free primary education and should also ensure high-quality health care is universally accessible for all, regardless of one’s ability to pay.

Deliberate retrogressive measures, such as Egypt’s reduction in spending on key elements affecting the rights of education and health care, are presumptively a violation of its obligations unless fully justified. Under international law, Egypt also has an obligation to protect the right to health by ensuring that privatization in the health sector does not pose threats to the availability, accessibility, acceptability, and quality of health care. 

“By systematically failing to meet constitutional spending requirements for education and health for many years, the government is neglecting the very sectors that would enable citizens to live with dignity and for the economy to thrive,” Magdi said. “This years-long failure shows that the government’s talk of social and economic rights is essentially lip service.”

Click to expand Image Old photo from April 9, 2020, of security forces patrolling the streets of Juba, South Sudan. © 2020 ALEX MCBRIDE/AFP via Getty Images South Sudan’s security forces, since late June 2025, have conducted sweeping arbitrary arrests of boys, young men, and women under the guise of a crackdown on criminals.Many were held for up to a week without charge and often released only after their families paid bribes. Young women were sexually assaulted, some young men and boys were forcibly conscripted, and some have not been seen since.The authorities should end arbitrary arrests and forced recruitment and investigate allegations of abuse including rape. South Sudan’s partners should ensure that any support they provide to the security forces is conditioned on respect for human rights.

(Nairobi) – South Sudan’s security forces have since late June 2025 conducted sweeping arbitrary arrests of boys and young men and women under the guise of a crackdown on criminals in the country’s capital, Juba, Human Rights Watch said today. In the course of these sweeps, security forces have subjected detained boys and young men to torture and ill-treatment, extortion, and forced conscription, and in at least one raid, police officers beat and raped women.

“Invoking the need to crack down against gangs in South Sudan’s capital, security forces have arbitrarily detained, extorted, and forcibly conscripted dozens of boys and young men and raped young women,” said Nyagoah Tut Pur, South Sudan researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The authorities should end these abuses, release those unlawfully detained and forcibly conscripted, and hold security forces to account.”

Between August 7 and November 23, Human Rights Watch remotely interviewed 37 people, including victims, 3 of them children, and relatives of people affected by the government sweeps in Juba. Human Rights Watch also spoke to 5 civil society activists, , United Nations and child protection experts.

On December 10, Human Rights Watch wrote to the police and military spokespersons to seek their response to the preliminary findings, but neither has responded.

Over the past decade, youth violence and gangs have surged in South Sudan, driven by poverty, unemployment, conflict, and displacement. In mid-June 2025, reports emerged of a video on social media showing the gang rape of a 16-year-old girl in Juba by alleged gang members.

Following reports of the rape and the video, the National Police Service, the South Sudan People’s Defence Forces (SSPDF), and the National Security Service began joint operations in the residential neighborhoods of Juba. The initial crackdown started in late June and was formally announced as a 7-day initiative at the start of July, but witnesses reported that arrests were ongoing as of the end of 2025.

By early July, the authorities announced that they had arrested at least 600 alleged gang members. In October, police said they had arrested 32 alleged criminals and confiscated weapons and that criminal proceedings would be initiated. However, Human Rights Watch has not been able to confirm any ongoing legal proceedings against individuals accused of crimes related to involvement in gangs other than in the gang rape case in which 13 were arrested and 7 charged.

Human Rights Watch found that the crackdown has resulted in arbitrary arrests and detentions, followed by beatings and other abuses in police and military facilities, as well as the forced conscription of dozens of boys and men.

People interviewed said that the security forces, both in uniform and civilian clothes and armed with guns or sticks, targeted boys and young men who were gathered or walking in groups and going about their daily life.

A 24-year-old man described his arrest in late June in the Gumbo neighborhood: “One hit me on the head saying I am a criminal.… They [also] beat us when making us sit down. With sticks, with their hands, anything. They were rough.”

Women who were detained in late June, when security forces raided a large party of young people at a hotel, told Human Rights Watch that they and other women were raped at the Buluk police station by multiple police officers.

Detainees have been kept in crowded police and military facilities. Some said that they were barely given food or water. A 17-year-old held at the Giyada military barracks for four days in late June said: “I saw boys below the age of 17 urinating in empty water bottles then drinking it.”

People interviewed who had been detained said they were held for periods ranging from a few hours to as long as a week, until their relatives paid money or offered goods to have them released. A 48-year-old mother whose two sons were detained at Mapao police station in mid-July said: “The [police officers] said it is a rule to pay 50,000 SSP [about US$10] and [give them] a chair for each child, so we complied.”

Some, however, were not released. Human Rights Watch spoke to four men and two boys who were detained in Juba and then sent with dozens of others to military camps in Upper Nile state, where fighting has escalated since early 2025. Three were forced into combat roles, and the others made to work for the soldiers.

A 23- year-old man, forcefully recruited in late August, was sent to fight twice before escaping. “The commanders would say ‘we have fought many wars now it’s your turn, after all you are criminals and gangs, this is what you want to do.’ Each time we were put up front.”

At least four family members interviewed said that their relatives have been missing since they were seen being detained by authorities, and that the authorities have refused to provide information on their whereabouts, including if they have been forcibly conscripted. Authorities are obligated to provide information confirming if a person has been detained or otherwise in their custody and information on the whereabouts and/or fate of every person taken into custody, including if they have been transferred to military custody as a conscript. Failure to do so may render the arbitrary detention an enforced disappearance, strictly prohibited under international law.

The police spokesperson rejected claims of forced conscription, telling the media in August that the operation targeted criminals and that some detainees had been moved outside of Juba because of overcrowding. Human Rights Watch could not independently confirm whether people had been moved due to overcrowding.

South Sudan’s domestic law and international human rights law prohibit the recruitment or use of children by armed forces or groups. South Sudan has also outlawed the forced conscription of adults in most circumstances. Multiple international and regional human rights treaties which South Sudan has ratified prohibit all unlawful or arbitrary arrests, detentions, or imprisonments, as well as torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment, including rape and sexual violence. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child requires that detention of children be used only as a measure of last resort.

The authorities should ensure that law enforcement operations respect human rights, including by ceasing arbitrary arrests and forced recruitments and investigating allegations of ill-treatment, torture, and other abuses, including rape. They should also ensure access to trauma-informed and gender-sensitive medical and psychosocial support for victims of security forces abuses, including rape survivors. The government should reveal the situation and whereabouts of all those missing, including those forced into military service, and grant independent monitors access to military barracks in Upper Nile, Human Rights Watch said.

South Sudan’s partners should ensure that any support they provide to the police and security forces is conditioned on respect for human rights, accountability for abuses, and measures to prevent child recruitment.

“Instead of responding to real concerns around criminality, the security forces have used this ‘law enforcement’ campaign to commit serious abuses against marginalized children and young people,” Pur said. “The authorities should ensure credible, rights-respecting responses to address crime, support youth programs, and stop further marginalizing South Sudan’s youth.”

For additional details and accounts of those detained, please see below.

Background and Context

Petty crime and violent turf wars are a serious problem in Juba. Social workers and two gang members told Human Rights Watch that young people join gangs seeking protection, a sense of belonging, or income. Social workers said that, in some cases, parents reported their children to local security forces, saying that they are unable to manage “bad” behavior.

In 2020–2021, Juba’s mayor, and then in 2023, national authorities, initiated operations against young people suspected of gang affiliation. The authorities have often arrested people and accused them of criminal behavior for no other reason than that they had dreadlocks, plaited, or dyed hair.

The crackdown in 2025 following the gang rape of the 16-year-old girl took place against the backdrop of a deteriorating political and security situation, especially in Upper Nile state. The government and its allied militias have been fighting the armed Nuer youth known as the White Army and the Sudan People’s Liberation Army-in-Opposition (SPLA-IO) under suspended First Vice President Riek Machar since March.

In mid-2025, the SSPDF, announced a recruitment drive for 4,000 soldiers, pressuring states to meet quotas because of low voluntary enlistment and high numbers of desertions from Upper Nile state, while many troops have gone unpaid.

South Sudan has a history of recruitment and use of children in military forces. Since war first broke out in 2013, government, armed opposition groups, and allied militias have recruited and used children in their forces. In 2018, the government and opposition groups signed a comprehensive Action Plan to “end and prevent all grave violations against children,” which expired on October 15, 2025, having not been fully implemented.

Arbitrary Arrests and Detentions

Since June, the police, the National Security Service, and military forces have arrested hundreds of children and young people without warrants or evidence that they have been linked to criminal behavior.

Human Rights Watch spoke to 18 adults and 3 children arrested in various neighborhoods of Juba, alone or in groups. They included students, motorbike drivers, casual laborers, bystanders, and others going about their lives. Human Rights Watch spoke to two self-identified gang members, but neither had been detained nor charged with any criminal wrongdoing.

Security forces arrested a 24-year-old student on July 19 along with three of his friends who were all at a neighbor’s house in the Lologo neighborhood, playing computer games. Following those arrests, the security forces moved through other neighborhoods of Juba between 6 and 9 p.m., arresting three boys listening to the radio outside their compound and 14 young people, including two in their 20s who were asleep at home. They also attempted to arrest three boys eating supper with their father, who intervened.

A 33-year-old man said he saw security forces violently detain a group of young people sitting under a tree in early July in Mia Saba: “A military truck arrived, then immediately they started arresting youths who were seated in one place,” he said. “I saw them running in different directions and the soldiers chasing them, beating others and throwing them into the vehicle.”

Those arrested were taken to police facilities in the capital including Buluk, Gumbo, Mapao, Lologo, and Gudele, to a military facility in Giyada and a military outpost in Gumbo.

A 23-year-old man said he was going to watch a football match in Lemon-Gaba neighborhood on the evening of late August when two police officers arrested him. “They came toward me and shouted, ‘You – where are you going?’ Before I could finish telling them, they handcuffed me.” He said he was detained at Buluk police station with 53 others for 5 days.

Parents struggled to locate children who had been detained. A woman whose 16-year-old son was arrested in late June still had no news of his whereabouts from police authorities when interviewed in August, even though others arrested with him had since been released. A civil society activist said in August that they received reports from 15 families searching for missing relatives.

In some instances, police demanded that parents provide student documents or solicit letters from local officials to establish that their children were not criminals.

People interviewed who had been released said they were held for periods of a few hours up to seven days. None had been charged or presented before a court before their release.

Victims and their families said the crackdown prompted fear and trauma. A community leader in Lologo said that people were afraid to lodge complaints about the abuses: “Everyone fears for his or her life.”

Torture and Ill-Treatment

Those detained and witnesses said that security forces beat, kicked, whipped, or otherwise mistreated people during their arrest and in custody.

A 21-year-old woman said that she saw security forces beat one man during his arrest in late June: “They beat him to the extreme and his eye started bleeding, something burst, now he cannot see.”

A 37-year-old man was arrested along with his two younger brothers at their home in Gumbo in late July. He said police officers tied them with ropes and beat them with sticks as they moved through neighborhoods picking up more people.

A 16-year-old boy arrested in early August in Lologo while grocery shopping said that a soldier brutally slapped him and that other military officers beat his two sisters when they tried to intervene.

Two men detained in early November said that police at Gurei station lashed them and five other detainees 100 times with a rubber roll used in grinding mills and shaved their hair. One of the men, a 34-year-old motorbike driver, said: “I was crying like a child and rolling on the ground. I could not sit for the first day. Even sleeping was hard.”

He said that officers had beaten a 30-year-old detainee during the night, accusing him of insulting the officers: “More than three police officers were beating him, he was crying saying he wasn’t the one who insulted the officers. They were kicking him using their legs and hitting him with their hands. They left him out there lying on the ground for a long time.… Then they pulled him by the leg and dragged him back into the cell.”

Police officers then contacted the 30-year-old detainee’s family because he was vomiting and urinating blood. A family member who confirmed the incident said that due to his severe injuries and safety concerns, they took him outside of the country after his release.

Harsh Detention Conditions

Detainees faced harsh conditions in both police and military facilities.

As dozens were brought in, detention sites became overcrowded. Detainees had inadequate access to food, clean water, sanitation, and medical care.

A 17-year-old student held at Giyada military barracks for four days in late June said: “Giyada was very full. I didn’t eat food, but I got a small amount of water. I saw some boys urinating in empty water bottles and then drink it.”

A 24-year-old student who was detained alongside 17 others in mid-July at Bome police sector in an unfinished mud house for one night said: “It was dirty … and with urine smell of those who might have been detained there previously … full of mosquitoes, frogs jumping on us throughout the night.… A human being is not supposed to sleep [there].”

Sexual Violence

At the onset of the crackdown in late June, security forces raided a large party of young people at a hotel, rounding up hundreds of partygoers. Human Rights Watch could not determine who had organized the party.

A woman, 19, who was at the party, said: “They came inside and stopped the function and started arresting us. Both male and female. [We] were accused of being gangs … [though] we do not identify as gang [members]. When the soldiers and police came in, they started beating and kicking everyone.”

Human Rights Watch spoke to four young women arrested during the raid and taken to the Buluk police station. Two of them said that multiple police officers raped them.

An 18-year-old woman said that two police officers raped her behind a building at the police station:

The first one said if I am quiet, he will not beat me. I was trying to speak to him, I tried to scream then the second policeman came, saying why are you taking so long, then he wanted to beat me, then he went back and left me with the first police [officer]. Then he came back again and raped me after the first one had raped me.

She said that the police had also raped or gang-raped five of her friends detained in the same incident. She said the police threatened her afterward: “They said … we [are] the police, we have big cameras, we shall see you accusing us and we shall go and pick you [up] wherever you are.”

Another woman, 21, said: “I tried to talk to him and told him I had [surgery] done five months ago … he refused. When I was crying, shouting for help, then two other officers came, not to rescue me, but to rape me as well.”

Survivors of sexual violence in South Sudan often face stigma, lack of support, and fear of reprisals. A 19-year-old woman arrested in the same incident said she knew eight girls and young women who had been raped by police after the raid and that survivors felt discouraged about getting post-rape services as the news of the incidents spread within her neighborhood and people said the victims “deserve to be punished.”

Bribery and Extortion

Most detainees and their relatives had to pay for their release either in cash, goods, or both.

The mother of the two sons, ages 17 and 24, who were arrested on July 19 went to the Mapao police station the day after the arrest. The police said she would have to pay for their release:

The boys were looking dirty because they slept on a bare floor of a muddied house.… I gave the police their school documents, but they said I could only free them with a fine worth 100,000 SSP (about US$20) for both and two new chairs. I said my sons have committed no crimes, they are students, ‘why do I have to pay a fine.’ They said it is a rule … and so we complied.

A 37-year-old man said two of his brothers detained at Mapao had to pay 50,000 SSP (about US$10) and a new chair each.

A 17-year-old boy arrested in late June along with seven others at Gudele roundabout while walking home from a party said his uncle had to pay 550,000 SSP (about US$110) to secure his release after he was held for four days in the Giyada military barracks.

One mother who paid a total of 300,000 SSP (about US$60) to the police to have her two sons released said she could not afford to pay their school fees as a result.

Forced Conscriptions of Children and Adults

Human Rights Watch spoke to four men and two boys who said they had been forcibly conscripted and nine family members whose children were or are believed to have been forcibly conscripted.

The conscripts were initially detained in both military and police facilities, then taken by the military to Juba International Airport. They were put on cargo or commercial flights to Malakal and then driven to Nasir and other conflict areas.

A 23-year-old man said he was arrested on August 28 and held for five days at Buluk police station, then flown to Nasir along with 80 others:

From Buluk police station to [Juba] airport, we were taken in a truck that carries sand. All 80 of us were put in a cargo plane to Malakal. At the airport they said: “We are all South Sudanese, we are one nation; you are the soldiers as of today. You are going to Nasir and you will fight the enemies of South Sudan. Do not dream of escaping from there.”

He reported being made to fight twice before escaping in late September.

A 20-year-old man said he was taken to Upper Nile with 75 others in late June and that by early July there were 517 people, including children, at his camp who had been forcefully recruited from Juba. He received two months of training in Gal Achel barracks and was then sent to fight in Nasir, in Ulang, and near the Ethiopian border. He escaped in October and said he was haunted by the memories of what he witnessed: “I have a lot of nightmares about my dead colleagues … at times my mind still feels like I am on the front lines.”

Three other forced conscripts said their military training was brief, ranging from two weeks to a month, and very basic, consisting of how to hold and shoot guns and march, before being given military uniforms and weapons and sent to fight. They also spoke of harsh conditions including inadequate food and medicine, discrimination, mistreatment, and verbal abuse by regular soldiers.

The 23-year-old man said he was sent to fight twice in Nasir: “[The] majority on the front line were new recruits. The commander would put all of us first mixed with a few SSPDF soldiers.” From his group of eighty recruits from Juba, he witnessed seven being killed, while another four were injured and taken to Malakal for treatment. He also said that since he fled Nasir, he has lived in fear and had not left his house.

A 17-year-old student arrested in late June said military officers tried to recruit him but instead released him and approximately 20 other children from the Giyada military barracks.

Human Rights Watch interviewed two children who said they had been forcibly conscripted and required to work for the soldiers.

A 17-year-old fruit seller arrested by police in late June and detained at Giyada with 200 others said that he and approximately 74 others were flown on a commercial plane to Malakal and then taken to Gal Achel barracks. “We were not given any responsibilities during the day. We could go fishing, that is it. In the morning, they would divide us, some go fetch firewood, some build houses for the soldiers.”

The forced conscripts described very difficult escapes from the military camps. The 23-year-old said that he tried to escape Gal Achel three times before succeeding. He said that he and others who were caught were whipped and punished. At least two youth who escaped from Nasir said they missed registering for their final high school exams and would have to retake the school year.

In early August, Machar’s opposition group released a video of 17 teenagers it said escaped from military bases after being taken from Juba in the crackdown. Media reported in early December that an alleged 25 forced recruits, most of them children, had escaped from a government military camp in Upper Nile into opposition-held territory.

Human Rights Watch continues to receive reports of forced conscription. A 30-year-old woman said that her brother, age 22, who was due to take high school exams in December, was arrested on November 11 and called three days later from Nasir saying that the army took him there.

Security forces have on occasion refused to acknowledge the detentions or reveal the situations of those forcibly conscripted.

A 40-year-old woman said that her 16-year-old son disappeared after his arrest on July 2 and she heard he was taken to Upper Nile, “As a mother I would be interested to know what crime he committed that they would send him there. He is a child; he cannot fight.”

A man told researchers that his 16-year-old son disappeared in late-June after his arrest:

The military arrested him at 6 p.m. on his way home.… We started searching for him the following day.… A week later, he called me with a phone of one of the senior officers in Nasir. I have not heard from him since and the phone he used is not going through.

He said he had yet to receive news on his son.

Relatives of another 19-year-old arrested on July 2 in Lologo and of a 21-year-old arrested in Atlabara on July 14 said they were still searching and believe the two may have been sent to Nasir.

Click to expand Image A church member reads a bible during a service in Hong Kong in solidarity with the Early Rain Covenant Church in China, whose members face persecution, December 18, 2023. © 2023 Stanley Leung/SOPA Images via ZUMA Wire/Reuters

(New York) – Chinese authorities have detained half a dozen members of an underground Protestant church based in Chengdu, Sichuan province, Human Rights Watch said today. This was the latest in a string of arrests of members of prominent unofficial “house churches” in China in the past year. 

The Early Rain Covenant Church posted on social media that on January 6, 2026, police raided the home of its current leader, Li Yingqiang (李英强), in Deyang and took him away. It said that other key church members were similarly taken into custody.

“The Chinese government has ushered in the new year with new arrests of underground Protestant church members,” said Yalkun Uluyol, China researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The government should immediately free those detained and let them freely practice their religion.”

Those detained include Dai Zhichao (戴志超), Ye Fenghua (叶丰华), Yan Hong (晏鸿), and Zeng Qingtao (曾庆涛). Another Early Rain adherent, Shu Qiong (舒琼), was summoned by police in Chengdu, Sichuan’s provincial capital, for “picking quarrels and provoking trouble.” Wu Wuqing (吴五清) was also summoned by the police, then released and warned against “being involved in the case.”

The Chinese government should immediately free those being detained for their religious beliefs and practices as protected under international human rights law. Until their release, the authorities should provide information about the detainees to their families and ensure that they have access to lawyers of their choice.

The crackdown on Early Rain Covenant Church occurred just weeks after authorities reportedly arrested approximately 100 members of another unofficial Protestant church, Yayang Church in Wenzhou, Zhejiang province, between December 13 and 18, 2025. At least two dozen members remain in detention. Local authorities surrounded the church on January 5 with hundreds of armed and special police, as well as bulldozers and other machinery, apparently to demolish part or all of the church, according to the US-based religious freedom organization China Aid.

In October 2025, in a nationwide crackdown, the authorities arrested nearly 30 pastors, preachers, and church members of Zion Protestant Church in seven cities, including Beijing, Shanghai, and Zhejiang. Those arrested include the church’s founder and pastor, Ezra Jin Mingri.

In mid-2025, courts in China convicted about a dozen people affiliated with the Linfen Golden Lampstand Church, an underground Protestant church in Shanxi province, for fraud. The church’s cofounder and pastor, Wang Xiaoguang, and his wife, Yang Rongli, were sentenced to 9 and 15 years in prison, respectively.

The Chinese government has targeted the Early Rain Covenant Church, founded in 2008, for years. In December 2018, Chengdu police took into custody over 100 congregants. Its founding pastor, Wang Yi, was sentenced to nine years in prison in 2019 for “inciting subversion of state power” and running “illegal business operations,” while another church leader, Qin Defu, was imprisoned for four years for “illegal business operations.” Li Yingqiang, the current leader, and three others were briefly detained in September 2024 for suspected “illegal activities.”

The government has a long history of severely restricting the right to freedom of religion. The 2005 Regulations on Religious Affairs require all religious groups to be registered and under the control of the authorities. Protestant churches face repeated pressure to become affiliated with the Three-Self Patriotic Movement, the official umbrella organization for Protestants.

State control over religion has escalated since 2016, when President Xi Jinping pledged to “Sinicize” religion, and tightened ideological control. The authorities have demolished hundreds of church buildings or the crosses atop them, prevented adherents from gathering in unofficial churches, restricted access to the Bible, confiscated religious materials not authorized by the government, and banned Bible and religious apps. The Sinicization of religion has also meant severe repression of Tibetan Buddhism and Islam.

Concerned governments should publicly condemn the Chinese government’s assault on religious freedom and pressure the authorities to free those affiliated with underground churches who have been detained for exercising their basic rights, Human Rights Watch said.

“Xi Jinping’s government has tightened ideological control and intensified its intolerance of loyalties beyond the Chinese Communist Party,” Uluyol said. “Concerned governments and religious leaders around the world should press the Chinese government to free detained religious adherents and respect religious freedom in China.”

Click to expand Image Protesters march in downtown Tehran, Iran, on December 29, 2025. © 2025 Fars News Agency/AP Photo

Iranian authorities are brutally cracking down on nationwide protests with lethal force, killing at least 27 protesters and bystanders, including children, and injuring many more in just over a week, while carrying out mass detentions of protesters. Human Rights Watch is investigating the government’s violent repression of the protests and related human rights violations.

Protests began on December 28 in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar and rapidly spread to at least 27 provinces across the country. While the protests were triggered by severe economic pressures, deteriorating living conditions, and pervasive government corruption, protesters’ demands are much broader and encompass fundamental and structural change, including a full transition to a democratic system that respects rights and human dignity.

The protests are the latest in a series of nationwide protests in Iran against the ruling system over the past decade. The authorities’ response has consistently been deadly repression, fueled by systematic impunity.

Reports by the media and Iranian human rights organizations show that security forces have used lethal force, including military grade weapons and metal pellets fired from shotguns, as well as tear gas and batons against unarmed protesters. Violent repression has included security force raids on Imam Khomeini Hospital in Ilam on January 4 and 5 in an apparent attempt to arrest injured protesters and confiscate the bodies of those killed. 

Iran Human Rights, an independent group, reported on January 6 that at least 27 protesters had been killed and hundreds more injured. The authorities have arrested and detained over a thousand people, including children as young as 14. Torture and enforced disappearance have been reported.

As during previous protests, authorities, including senior officials, have vilified protesters by labeling them as “rioters” and threatened a harsher response if they continue to take to the streets. On January 3, Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, said: “There is no use in talking to rioters; rioters must be put in their place.”

Peaceful assembly and public dissent are fundamental rights. The authorities’ use of lethal force in circumstances that do not meet the strict threshold of an imminent risk of death or serious injury and arbitrarily detaining people for exercising their basic rights are violations of international human rights law. 

The Iranian authorities should immediately halt the unlawful use of force and release all those arbitrarily detained. The United Nations and concerned governments should urgently pursue accountability measures, including criminal accountability, against those responsible for serious violations of human rights and crimes under international law.

Click to expand Image Prominent student activist Umar Khalid speaks during a protest against sectarian violence, the Citizenship Amendment Act and the National Register of Citizens on March 3, 2020 in Dehli, India. © 2020 Manish Rajput/SOPA Images/Sipa USA via AP Photo

India’s Supreme Court on January 5 denied bail to prominent student activists Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam, who have been detained without trial for over five years. The court granted bail to five others arrested in the same case, holding that Khalid and Imam stood on “qualitatively different footing.”

The authorities arrested the 7 along with 11 other activists in 2020 under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, India’s abusive counterterrorism law, in connection with communal violence that broke out in Delhi that year between supporters and opponents of the 2019 Citizenship Amendment Act, which discriminates against Muslim irregular migrants seeking citizenship. The violence left 53 dead and hundreds injured, most of them Muslim.

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights as a general rule encourages release, including bail, for those in pretrial custody. The prosecution has presented no evidence, such as calls for violence, that would warrant pretrial detention. The case relies heavily on anonymous witnesses and WhatsApp chats in which participants discuss organizing peaceful protests the police have presented as evidence of complicity in a larger conspiracy to instigate riots. The Supreme Court, in denying bail to Khalid and Imam, held that “terrorist acts” should not be interpreted narrowly to include only acts of violence, but should encompass broader actions that disrupt the economy.

A July 2020 report by the independent Delhi Minorities Commission found the violence in Delhi was “planned and targeted,” and that the police were filing cases against Muslim victims of the violence, while not taking action against the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party leaders who incited it. Human Rights Watch and others have also documented clear bias by the authorities in the investigations, arresting peaceful protesters and accusing them of a “conspiracy” to “defame the country in the international arena.”

Over the years, several United Nations human rights experts have called for the immediate release of these activists.

In recent years, India’s courts have repeatedly denied bail to activists arrested under the counterterrorism law despite ample evidence that the law is being used to target peaceful protesters and critics of the government. The Supreme Court’s decision to keep Khalid and Imam for at least another year in jail without trial undercuts its repeated emphasis on bail as a fundamental right, and will have a chilling effect on rights to freedom of expression, association, and peaceful assembly.

(Bangkok) – Thailand and Cambodia should fully abide by international humanitarian law in any fighting along their border, Human Rights Watch said today. Both sides have used explosive weapons with wide area effects during the five days of fighting in July 2025 and since December 8, which have killed and wounded civilians and displaced thousands of people.

On December 22, the Cambodian Interior Ministry stated that 20 civilians, including children, had been killed and 79 injured by Thai airstrikes and rocket and artillery attacks. The Thai government stated on December 15 that one civilian had been killed and five injured during recent fighting. Human Rights Watch could not corroborate this information.

“Clashes along the Cambodian-Thai border have put civilians at risk along with schools, medical facilities, and religious and cultural sites,” said John Sifton, Asia advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “Thai and Cambodian authorities should take all steps necessary to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure as required by international humanitarian law.”

The fighting in December has quickly spread to areas in Surin, Ubon Ratchathani, Si Sa Ket, Buriram, Sa Kaeo, Chanthaburi, and Trat provinces in Thailand and Preah Vihear, Oddar Meanchey, Banteay Meanchey, and Siem Reap provinces in Cambodia. Cambodian forces have carried out rocket and artillery attacks on Thailand. Thailand has deployed F-16 and Gripen jets and drones for airstrikes along with artillery and rocket fire.

More than half a million civilians have been displaced in the two countries. Thai authorities said they have closed at least 1168 schools and 212 hospitals for safety reasons.

Cambodian authorities have alleged that Thai forces have carried out targeted airstrikes and artillery fire at the UNESCO World Heritage site of Preah Vihear Temple and other cultural heritage sites, including Takrabei Temple and Ta Moan Temple. Thailand has accused Cambodia of using those cultural heritage sites as military bases in violation of the laws of war.

Cambodia also accused Thailand of using internationally prohibited cluster munitions. Neither Thailand nor Cambodia are parties to the Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM), which bans all use, but Human Rights Watch considers any use of the weapon in populated areas to be unlawfully indiscriminate. Thailand’s last confirmed use of cluster munitions was during border clashes with Cambodia in July 2025. Thailand and Cambodia should not use cluster munitions and should ratify the CCM, which currently has 111 states parties, Human Rights Watch said.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) should promptly establish an effective, impartial, and transparent monitoring mechanism to report on violations of the laws of war and humanitarian issues. Under the October peace agreement between Thailand and Cambodia, both countries agreed to an ASEAN Observer Team to ensure compliance, as well as to help dispel disinformation by both sides. This observer team should be deployed immediately so that it can go to border areas to investigate alleged violations of the laws of war.

International humanitarian law, or the laws of war, obligate parties to a conflict to distinguish between combatants and civilians at all times. Civilians may never be the deliberate target of attacks. Warring parties are required to take all feasible precautions to minimize harm to civilians and civilian objects and provide effective advance warnings of attacks unless circumstances do not permit. Attacks that fail to discriminate between combatants and civilians, or may be expected to cause disproportionate harm to civilians compared to the anticipated military gain, are prohibited.

Using explosive weapons with wide area effects, such as multiple-launch rocket systems, in populated areas poses a grave threat to civilians given the weapons’ inherent inaccuracy, large blast radius, and rapid delivery of multiple munitions at the same time. When used in villages, towns, and cities, explosive weapons cause immediate harm to civilians and civilian structures. Reverberating, or long-term, effects include damage to buildings and critical infrastructure that interferes with services such as health care and education.

Explosive weapons also cause displacement of the population and destroy cultural heritage sites and the environment. Both Cambodia and Thailand endorsed the 2022 political declaration committing to adopt and implement national policies and practices to help avoid and address civilian harm, including by restricting or refraining from the use of explosive weapons in populated areas.

Thailand and Cambodia ratified the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty, which comprehensively prohibits any production, transfer, stockpiling, or use of antipersonnel mines. Under the treaty, countries are obligated to prevent and suppress any noncompliance, including by taking measures to prosecute and punish those responsible for use of antipersonnel mines on their territory.

On November 10, four Thai soldiers were injured by a landmine while patrolling along the disputed border in Kantharalak district of Si Sa Ket province. Thailand alleged that Cambodia had recently laid antipersonnel mines in Thai territory and consequentially suspended the bilateral peace agreement with Cambodia. Cambodia and Thailand should set a timeline to urgently establish a fact-finding mechanism within the framework of the Mine Ban Treaty.

“Diplomatic efforts on the Thai-Cambodia border dispute should prioritize protecting civilians,” Sifton said. “There should also be a concerted international support for accountability for serious violations of international humanitarian law and human rights.”

Click to expand Image Head of the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan Ali Karimli (C) and his supporters hold an unauthorized rally to demand the right to freedom of assembly, in Baku, Azerbaijan, October 19, 2019. © 2019 Aziz Karimov/Reuters

Azerbaijani authorities have intensified their long-running crackdown on the opposition Azerbaijan Popular Front Party, building on years of politically motivated prosecutions and intimidation. In recent months, authorities have increasingly targeted the party’s leadership.

On December 19, a court sentenced Murad Sultan, a senior party official, to 30 days of administrative detention. This followed the November 29 court order that placed the party chair, Ali Karimli, in pretrial detention on charges of attempting to violently seize power. Authorities have also detained several of his bodyguards and his driver. Karimli has faced a travel ban since 2005.

In 2025, Azerbaijani authorities sharply escalated their campaign against the Popular Front Party, arbitrarily arresting and detaining dozens of party members across the country, pursuing spurious administrative and criminal charges, and subjecting the party leadership and members to other forms of harassment. Police and courts relied on vague and widely abused misdemeanor charges of “petty hooliganism” and “disobeying police orders,” or brought criminal charges that party members assert were fabricated. Party officials report that at least 20 members are currently imprisoned.

Concerns about the crackdown deepened after imprisoned party member Elbeyi Kerimli, 22, died by apparent suicide on December 12. Authorities had arrested him in August 2023 after he painted “Stalin” on a statue of former president Heydar Aliyev, who died in 2003, and later charged him with large-scale drug possession. Authorities announced an investigation into Kerimli’s death but have not made its findings public.

On December 13, a Baku court ordered three months of pretrial detention for party member Vugar Gadirov on weapons possession charges.

In April, a court sentenced Mehman Aliyev, a party member, to five years in prison on spurious drug-related charges. Aliyev said authorities brought the charges in retaliation for his filming and publishing footage of alleged police abuse.

Throughout 2025, police detained activists in Binagadi, Yevlakh, Ordubad, Lankaran, and other regions after summoning them to police stations and rushing them through court hearings, often holding them incommunicado for several days.

Azerbaijani authorities should immediately release all individuals detained solely for peaceful political activity, lift restrictions on political opposition, including the 20-year travel ban on Ali Karimli, and ensure independent and impartial investigations into allegations of abuse and deaths in custody.

Click to expand Image The F1 Grand Prix at Jeddah Corniche Circuit in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, April 20, 2025. © 2025 Qian Jun/Paddocker via AP Photo

The International Automobile Federation (Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile, or FIA), the international body governing motor sports, including Formula1, held its annual General Assemblies last week in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. 

At the General Assemblies, the federation presented Uzbekistan as the “star of the east,” seemingly without a single reference to Uzbekistan’s deeply problematic human rights record. In recent years, Uzbek authorities have increasingly stifled human rights activism and freedom of expression, targeting activists, bloggers, and others with unfounded criminal and administrative charges. Despite United Nations experts calling for his immediate release, Karakalpak activist and lawyer Dauletmurat Tazhimuratov is languishing in prison, serving a wrongful 16-year prison sentence, his allegations of ill-treatment and torture ignored by authorities. 

The FIA’s statutes instruct it to “promote the protection of human rights and human dignity,” while its Code of Ethicsaffirms its “responsibility to safeguard the integrity and reputation of motor sport.” Promoting and conducting business with a country without conducting a human rights impact assessment is risky. Doing so may breach the FIA’s regulations and leave a lasting stain on motor sports. 

The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights set out how businesses should implement policies and conduct due diligence in regards to their impact on human rights. Such due diligence should include the risk of laundering the reputations of governments, businesses, or individuals responsible for ongoing or recent serious rights abuses.

Human Rights Watch has previously raised rights concerns in connection with FIA and Formula 1 activities in Azerbaijanand Saudi Arabia, where abusive governments have used motor sports to whitewash their reputations. 

Prior to the assemblies in Tashkent, Human Rights Watch asked the FIA and Formula 1, who adopted a commitment to respect human rights, their plans to discuss rights issues during the assemblies and the type of due diligence they conduct. We received no response.

FIA President Mohammed Ben Sulayem, recently re-elected for a second term, should seize this opportunity to take much stronger human rights actions in Uzbekistan and globally. The federation should use its influence with governments to urge rights reforms and roll out comprehensive due diligence to identify and remedy any adverse rights impact of its activities and ensure that motor sports continue to “drive society forward.”

Click to expand Image US President Donald Trump shows a signed executive order classifying fentanyl as 'weapon of mass destruction' during a Mexican Border Defense Medal presentation in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, DC, December 15, 2025. © 2025 Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters

A new executive order seeking to designate “illicit fentanyl” a “weapon of mass destruction” could open the door to a dangerous expansion of militarized law enforcement and abusive military action.

The December 15 order directs the defense secretary and attorney general to “determine whether the threats posed by fentanyl and its impact on the United States” justifies the Defense Department aiding the Justice Department in law enforcement.

The order states that fentanyl has the potential “to be weaponized for concentrated, large-scale terror attacks by organized adversaries.” But domestic and international law already authorize responsive action if fentanyl were employed as a chemical weapon. 

This order is particularly worrying amid the Trump administration’s use of drug trafficking as a pretext to justify unlawful military strikes. Since September, the administration has carried out more than two dozen strikes on alleged drug trafficking boats in the Caribbean and Pacific, resulting in at least 99 extrajudicial killings. This context raises the concern that the order aims to facilitate an expansion of such unlawful actions.

The executive order is also dangerous in the current domestic context, following months of National Guard deployments to multiple US cities. While US law enforcement agencies commit many human rights abuses, the involvement of the military in law enforcement would pose additional risks. Military forces bring fundamentally different training and experience to bear, focused less on rights-respecting law enforcement and more on the effective use of lethal force.

While governments have a legitimate interest in working to stop drug trafficking, addressing the harm of unregulated fentanyl requires an emphasis on evidence-based public health interventions. Militarized policing in US communities could unleash serious abuses, especially against Black and other overpoliced communities. US drug policy has historically fueled racially discriminatory policing, arrests, and incarceration. It has not adequately addressed harm caused by drug trafficking, like overdose deaths, which disproportionately affect Black and Indigenous people, who face disparities in health care access.

The administration should channel concern about fentanyl into harm reduction strategies that safeguard rights, rather than calling it a weapon of mass destruction to create the illusion of a threat that warrants military action.