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Niger: Six Month-Long Arbitrary Detention of Human Rights Defender Moussa Tiangari Must End
(Nairobi) – Niger’s authorities should immediately release civil society activist and human rights defender Moussa Tiangari and stop using terrorism-related charges to silence dissent, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), and the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT), in the framework of the Observatory for the protection of human rights defenders, said today.
On December 3, 2024, men claiming to be policemen arrested Tiangari at his home in Niamey, Niger’s capital. On January 3, 2025, the Niamey High Court charged him with several serious offences, including “criminal conspiracy in connection with a terrorist enterprise,” “undermining national defence,” and “plotting against the authority of the state through intelligence with enemy powers.” If convicted of plotting with enemy powers, he could face the death penalty.
On the same day, Tiangari was remanded to Filingué prison, 170 kilometers from Niamey, where he remains arbitrarily held in pretrial detention. Since then, he has not been interviewed on the merits of the charges against him before a judge.
“Moussa Tiangari is being detained solely for the exercise of his human rights. We urge the authorities to immediately release him and drop all charges. We are deeply concerned about the use of charges like these to silence critics of the government,” said Marceau Sivieude, interim regional director for West and Central Africa at Amnesty International.
Three weeks before his arrest, on November 12, 2024, Tiangari criticized on social media the decision of Niger’s interior minister to revoke the licenses of two humanitarian nongovernmental organizations. He also criticized the establishment of a terrorism database, a move that further undermines the human rights of the people of Niger. Tiangari risks being stripped of his Nigerien nationality on terrorism charges, based on an August 2024 ordinance establishing a database for individuals and groups associated with terrorism and national defence offences.
Under Niger’s penal code, terrorism-related charges can result in up to four years’ non-renewable preventive detention. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, FIDH, and OMCT have examined the charges and can confirm that none of them relate to internationally recognizable offences, as each relates to the legitimate exercise of the right to freedom of expression.
“Tiangari’s arrest is part of a wider trend of repression by the Nigerien authorities, who target and subject to constant judicial harassment all those who publicly criticize them, with the aim of silencing them,” said Drissa Traoré, secretary general of FIDH.
“Moussa Tiangari’s arrest and subsequent detention sends a chilling message to anyone who may dare to criticize Niger’s slide toward autocracy,” said Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Sahel researcher at Human Rights Watch.
“Tiangari’s arrest is a grave mistake and counterproductive. For decades, he has embodied the Nigerien people’s call for democracy, security, resource sovereignty, and independence. Any government that respects the people’s will must release him,” said Isidore Ngueuleu, head of the Africa Regional Desk at OMCT.
Background
Tiangari, 55, is the secretary general of the civil society organization Citizens Alternative Spaces (Alternative Espaces Citoyens, AEC). At about 7:30 p.m. on December 3, 2024, at least three gunmen in plain clothes arrested Tiangari at his home in Niamey and seized his phone, laptop, and suitcase. His fate and whereabouts were unknown for two days.
On December 5, 2024, he was located at the Central Service for Combating Terrorism and Organized Transnational Crime in Niamey.
In March and May 2025 respectively, the Nigerien courts rejected Tiangari’s lawyers’ applications to have the case declared null and void and for the judicial division specialising in combating terrorism and cross-border organized crime to relinquish jurisdiction. Tiangari’s lawyers have appealed against these rulings.
Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, FIDH, and OMCT have called for Tiangari’s immediate and unconditional release. Amnesty International supporters have been taking action on his behalf.
In a joint press statement issued in July 2024, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and FIDH expressed their deep concern and denounced the repression carried out by Niger’s military authorities against the opposition, the media, and peaceful dissent since they took power by a coup in July 2023.
In a report issued in March 2025, Amnesty International documented the clampdown on former government officials and critical voices since the coup.
Israel, Yemen: Investigate Airport Attacks as War Crimes
(Beirut) – The Israeli airstrikes on Yemen’s Sanaa International Airport on May 6 and May 28, 2025, were apparently unlawful indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks on civilian objects and should be investigated as war crimes, Human Rights Watch said today. The Houthis’ attacks that deliberately targeted Ben Gurion Airport and other civilian infrastructure in Israel should also be investigated as war crimes.
The Israeli attacks destroyed all commercial passenger aircraft operating out of the Sanaa airport, cutting off civilians’ ability to travel and limiting the ability of humanitarian aid and personnel to enter. The Houthis attackedBen Gurion Airport prior to both of the Israeli forces’ airport attacks and in one case reportedly injured four people.
“The Sanaa airport is a critical lifeline for Yemeni civilians, many of whom rely on the airport as their only means to access needed medical care,” said Niku Jafarnia, Yemen and Bahrain researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The Israeli military has now severed that lifeline, leaving many Yemenis without their primary point of access to the outside world.”
Israeli forces’ attacks destroyed four aircraft of Yemenia Airways—the only airline that provides commercial flights for Sanaa passengers—and damaged and destroyed significant portions of the airport. Four other aircraft, including a cargo plane, were also destroyed, according to Human Rights Watch analysis of satellite imagery.
Human Rights Watch analyzed videos and photographs taken by the Houthi-run news channel Al-Masirah and posted to social media. The videos following the first attack show four aircraft on fire and damage to the facade and interior of airport buildings, including the main entrance. Photographs and satellite imagery after the second attack show one additional Yemenia Airways aircraft destroyed.
The Israeli military’s Arabic spokesperson, Avichay Adraee, published a warning on X prior to the first strike, prompting airport authorities to evacuate the airport in advance of the attack. Airlines and airport officials may have also received an earlier warning, as a United Nations flight scheduled to land in Sanaa airport at 1:30 p.m. was cancelled. Videos of the attack appeared on social media around 3:45 p.m. local time.
Satellite imagery collected on May 7 shows seven destroyed aircraft on the tarmac and severe damage to the main terminal. Eight additional impact points are visible on the runway and taxiways, leaving the airport unable to operate. On May 8, Adraee posted on X that the attacks had “completely disabled Sanaa Airport.”
Khaled al-Shaif, the director of Sanaa airport, told Al Jazeera that the attack had “destroyed the airport terminals, the supply building, and six aircraft, and caused severe damage to the runway.”
Three sources at the airport told Reuters that the military airbase next to the airport was also attacked. Human Rights Watch did not identify any direct strike on the airbase buildings based on satellite imagery analysis. The airbase buildings had been largely destroyed prior to this attack.
On May 15, the first UN flight since the May 6 attack landed at Sanaa airport. Between then and the attack on May 28, commercial flights also resumed. Flights have not resumed since the second attack.
Israeli forces carried out the second attack on the morning of May 28. Civilians, including pilgrims awaiting a flight to Saudi Arabia and staff from the humanitarian group Médicins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders or MSF), were at the airport at the time of the attack, though none were harmed. Adraee did not publish a warning on X. Human Rights Watch analyzed a screen recording of a video that appears to have been filmed by airport security cameras. The video shows people rapidly disembarking from the Yemenia Airbus A320-233 aircraft, apparently at least 45 minutes before it was struck. A plume of smoke can be seen rising to the east of the aircraft as fire engines sound their sirens. This could indicate that the Israeli military may have provided some form of warning before the attack. According to a flight-tracking website, the plane landed at 9:28 a.m., and the shadows cast by the passengers disembarking the plane indicate it was around 9:30 a.m. The attack that destroyed the aircraft likely took place between 10:15 and 11:00 a.m., according to news reports and social media posts.
Israeli forces also previously attacked Sanaa airport in December 2024. That attack killed at least four people and injured at least 18 others, according to the Houthis’ Health Ministry, including a crew member aboard a UN flight. The director-general of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, was boarding the same plane at the time.
The airport is the only one in Sanaa and the only one providing international flights from Houthi-controlled territory, where the majority of Yemen’s population lives. The airport is also a critical entry point for humanitarian personnel, as well as some aid, and it is also used for UN flights. The Houthis seized the Yemenia planes in June 2024. Soon after, the Houthis and the internationally-recognized Yemeni government agreed to allow flights between Sanaa and Cairo, India, and Amman.
UN agencies and nongovernmental organizations have highlighted the importance of the Sanaa airport to civilians. After Israeli forces’ attack in December, UN Resident Coordinator for Yemen Julien Harneis, who was in the airport on the day of the attack, stated that the airport “is a civilian location that is used by the United Nations.” He also said that the airport was “absolutely vital” to continued humanitarian aid for Yemen. Harneis told Human Rights Watch: “Health services in Yemen are rudimentary. You have an older population in Yemen with diabetes, cancer, noncommunicable diseases for which they’re unable to get treatment in Yemen. The airport has always been vital to getting those people out.”
Afrah Nasser, a Yemeni journalist and former Human Rights Watch researcher, highlighted in 2024 that “nearly 60 percent of [cancer] patients [in Yemen] die due to a lack of resources, medical tools and services, and the scarcity of medicines at cancer treatment centers.”
The Israeli military, in response to a May 19 request for information, said it was “striking legitimate military targets belonging to the Houthi regime in Yemen,” and that it had carried out the strikes “with maximum precision, and steps were taken to mitigate harm to civilians and civilian infrastructure.” It has also stated that the airport was “a central hub for the Houthi terrorist regime to transfer weapons and operatives.”
Human Rights Watch was unable to find evidence that the terminals and planes struck were used by the Houthis for military purposes. The Israeli military did not provide details to support its claim.
The Israeli military stated that both attacks were in response to the Houthis’ attacks on Ben Gurion Airport, Israel’s main passenger airport. The Houthis have directed attacks at the airport many times since 2023, including several during the week prior to the May 28 strikes. Israeli forces and defense systems intercepted most attacks, though a May 4 attack was not intercepted and reportedly injured four people.
The laws of war prohibit deliberate, indiscriminate, or disproportionate attacks on civilians and civilian objects. An attack not directed at a specific military objective is indiscriminate. An attack is disproportionate if the expected civilian loss is excessive compared to the anticipated military gain of the attack. Attacks that can be expected to cause more harm to civilians and civilian structures than the anticipated military gain of the attack are prohibited.
Deliberate attacks on objects indispensable to survival are war crimes.
“Israeli forces have repeatedly carried out unlawful attacks on critical civilian infrastructure in Yemen, Gaza, and Lebanon with impunity,” Jafarnia said. “Countries still arming Israel risk being complicit in these brazen attacks and share responsibility for the grave harm to Yemeni and other civilians that has resulted.”
Ukraine: Russia Using Drones to Attack Civilians
(Kyiv, June 3, 2025) – Russian forces have repeatedly used drones to attack civilians and civilian objects in Kherson city in southern Ukraine, serious violations of the laws of war, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today.
June 3, 2025 Hunted From AboveThe 93-page report, “Hunted From Above: Russia’s Use of Drones to Attack Civilians in Kherson, Ukraine” and an accompanying web feature, document how Russian forces appear to be deliberately or recklessly carrying out drone strikes against civilians and civilian objects with these mostly inexpensive commercially available drones. The attacks spread terror among the civilian population and cause them to fear leaving their homes, and have caused the depopulation of the two areas being targeted in Kherson.
“Russian drone operators are able to track their targets, with high-resolution video feeds, leaving little doubt that the intent is to kill, maim, and terrify civilians,” said Belkis Wille, associate crisis, conflict and arms director at Human Rights Watch. “They exemplify why the international community needs to support all avenues of accountability for victims of Russian war crimes and crimes against humanity in Ukraine.”
Human Rights Watch interviewed 36 survivors of and witnesses to Russian drone attacks in Kherson and analyzed 83 videos of drone attacks uploaded, often with captions, to Russian military-affiliated Telegram channels as well as videos and photographs taken by witnesses and shared with researchers. Through these videos, Human Rights Watch confirmed that Russian forces used commercially available quadcopter drones manufactured by two China-based commercial drone companies, DJI and Autel, and one model made by a Russian entity, Sudoplatov, which describes itself as a volunteer organization.
Listen, Run, HideHow Russia Uses Quadcopter Drones to Hunt and Kill Civilians in Kherson, Ukraine
Read hereBoth DJI and Autel responded to letters from Human Rights Watch, acknowledging reports that their drones were being used by Russian forces for combat purposes. They stressed that such use was incompatible with company policies, and provided information on steps they take to avoid their drones potentially being used for such purposes. Sudoplatov and the Russian government have not responded.
Human Rights Watch documented at least 45 deliberate drone attacks by Russian forces from June to December 2024 on civilians and civilian objects, including on healthcare and other essential goods and services in the neighborhoods of Antonivka and Dniprovskyi of Kherson. Between May and December, drone attacks in Kherson resulted in almost 500 civilian injuries and 30 fatalities according to the Kherson City Council Executive Committee. The attacks continue.
Click to expand Image © 2025 Human Rights WatchDrone attacks accounted for 70 percent of civilian casualties recorded in Kherson in January 2025 by the United Nations Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine.
Russian forces have used drones to attack civilians while they were out walking, cycling, driving, taking public transport to and from work, and in their homes. Some residents said they tried to hide or evade a drone that followed them for several minutes.
Russian-operated drones have targeted healthcare facilities and ambulances and their personnel, including rescue workers responding to drone attacks on civilians. Ambulance personnel said their teams could no longer respond to calls in some areas for fear of drone attacks. Instead, police teams in armored vehicles had to transport those injured to medical facilities.
Russian forces also carried out drone attacks on grocery stores and vehicles delivering produce to stores, forcing nearly all stores in the affected areas to close. Drone attacks on gas, water, and electrical infrastructure – and on municipal workers attempting to repair the damage – have further limited residents’ access to basic services.
Russian forces have armed quadcopter drones with internationally-prohibited antipersonnel landmines that they have scattered in Kherson neighborhoods. The PFM antipersonnel mines are contaminating areas and injuring civilians. These attacks have hampered efforts to clear landmines and other explosive war remnants.
Click to expand Image Models of a VT-40 (left) and a DJI Mavic (right) and their components. © 2025 Human Rights WatchThe overwhelming impact of this campaign has been to force people to leave the area. Between May and December 2024, Antonivka’s population decreased by close to half, according to the Kherson City Council Executive Committee.
Those who remain – mostly older people and those unable to evacuate easily – are afraid to leave their homes. They say that when they do, they are constantly listening for the buzzing sound of drones overhead, scanning the area around them for potential hiding spots under trees, and looking out for landmines that may have been dropped during drone attacks.
These attacks on civilians are serious violations of the laws of war that, when committed with criminal intent, constitute war crimes. Human Rights Watch also found that these attacks on civilians in Kherson using armed quadcopter drones constitute apparent crimes against humanity. The attacks resulted in the intentional killing or infliction of serious bodily or mental or physical health injuries, conducted as part of a widespread attack on the civilian population in Kherson, and appear to have been in furtherance of a Russian policy behind that attack. Examined in their totality and over time, the pattern of attacks seems to be part of an apparent Russian strategy whose primary purpose has been to spread terror among the civilian population.
The ability of Russian forces to arm relatively inexpensive and commercially available drones to carry out illegal attacks underscores the urgency of identifying effective ways to enforce respect for international humanitarian law, including through prosecutions of war crimes, Human Rights Watch said. Governments should also work with commercial drone companies to develop and implement safeguards to prevent or minimize drones being used for unlawful combat purposes.
“The attacks in Kherson are a staggering case study in what life is like when civilians are being hunted from above with blood-chilling precision,” Wille said. “It is alarming that these unlawful attacks can be achieved by arming relatively cheap and commercially available drones: Kherson should serve as a harbinger of what life for civilians could become in conflict areas around the globe if respect for international humanitarian law is not enforced.”
Selected Episodes Click to expand Image Screengrab of a drone video uploaded to the Russian military-affiliated Telegram channel “From Mariupol to the Carpathians” on October 9, 2024, showing Anastasia Pavlenko continuing to ride her bicycle after a drone dropped a munition next to her.On September 28, Anastasia Pavlenko, 23, was cycling along the main road between Antonivka and Kherson. “Suddenly,” she said, “I saw a drone take off from a roof and start to chase me.” The drone followed Pavlenko for nearly 300 meters. She said she was still on her bicycle and less than 100 meters from the Antonivka bridge when “the drone dropped a grenade. I was injured in my neck, left leg, and under the rib.” In shock, Pavlenko continued toward the underpass. “I was still biking, covered in blood and with flat tires.”
The next day, a video showing the attack on Pavlenko was uploaded to a Russian military-affiliated telegram channel. It is captioned:
Ukrainian Armed Forces soldiers ride bicycles. This character was accurately eliminated … [Medical] Evacuation is not allowed to approach.
When Human Rights Watch spoke to Pavlenko in late November, she had moved to a different city, and said she still had a metal fragment in her neck that surgeons could not remove due to its position. Pavlenko spent seven days in the hospital. She has not been back to Kherson since. “If not for the drones, I would still live there,” she said.
Tetiana Kravchuk, a lawyer from Antonivka, said she left home on foot on October 30, 2024, at 6:30 a.m., to feed her neighbor’s dog. Kravchuk checked the street for landmines. As she was returning to her house, she heard a drone. Kravchuk said:
It was behind me, chasing me. I tried to hide between the trees. I heard the drone circling the tree, coming closer and closer. The drone was four meters above me. Then there was an explosion.
Kravchuk said, “I called my son and told him that a drone had attacked me, and my leg was injured.” Her son took her to the hospital, where she underwent surgery and spent six days. When Human Rights Watch interviewed Kravchuk in late November, she was still in treatment, after which she was to begin six months of rehabilitation.
On October 28, at 8 p.m., Volodymyr Pavlyuk, 64, an ambulance driver, along with Dr. Serhiy Kucherenko, 64, and a medical assistant, Viktoria Zhogha, 40, responded to a call in Antonivka, where two people had leg injuries from a drone-dropped munition.
Click to expand Image Screengrab of a drone video uploaded to the Russian military-affiliated Telegram channel “From Mariupol to the Carpathians” on October 29, 2024, showing at least five people around the ambulance before it was struck by a drone-dropped munition. The cyrillic text visible on the screen is a derogatory Russian phrase against Ukrainians.After the team’s arrival, while they were standing near the ambulance, Zhogha heard a drone and shouted, “Drone! Drone!” She said: “I started calling the doctor and tried to hide, but I didn’t know where. It was too dark. We were panicking. At the last second, I tried to enter the ambulance.” The explosion occurred at that moment.
Pavlyuk found both colleagues injured. “There was a puddle of blood around Serhiy [Dr. Kucherenko] and he was silent,” he said. Vika [Zhogha] had wounds to her leg.” Pavlyuk suffered a concussion and hearing damage. The blast also damaged the ambulance.
Pavlyuk loaded both colleagues and one injured civilian into the ambulance, placing the second civilian in the front seat. He drove to a safer location under a tree to wait for another ambulance. The doctor was later pronounced dead at the hospital.
Zhogha suffered fragmentation injuries to both legs, her right hip, and stomach.
Human Rights Watch verified a drone video posted to a Russian military-affiliated Telegram channel that shows the attack. The first clip appears to show the attack that injured the two people Pavlyuk and his team were responding to. The clip starts with a drone flying and then hovering above a tree near some houses. In the second clip, a drone is flying to the same location and hovers over the ambulance. A munition is visible, falling toward the group of people for a few frames before an explosion occurs near the front right side of the vehicle.
Serhii Dolhov, 50, lives in Dniprovske, 8 kilometers west of Kherson. On November 3, he was walking near his apartment building when he stepped on a PFM antipersonnel mine that exploded. His left foot was almost completely severed by the blast and his right leg was injured by plastic fragments. Dolhov said, “I walked in this area a lot, so the mine must have appeared there maybe two or three days earlier. I am always looking up for drones, I wasn’t looking down for mines.”
Justice Delayed in Central African Republic
Last week marked one year since Joseph Figueira Martin was arrested in the Central African Republic. The former analyst for the International Crisis Group was arrested by Russian forces in Zemio, in the southeast, where he was conducting research for FHI 360, an American organization aimed at reducing poverty, expanding economic opportunities, and preventing gender-based violence.
As his family and friends mark this somber anniversary, there is no date yet fixed for his trial.
I worked with Joe, a Portuguese-Belgian citizen, at Crisis Group for several years. He was highly respected by his colleagues as smart, conscientious, and caring. He became an expert on Central Africa and has since worked for several international organizations looking at the drivers of conflict across the region.
But for the past year, he has been held in Camp de Roux in Bangui, the capital, a military prison for the most high-profile prisoners. The authorities accused him of financing and coordinating activities for armed groups, including the Union for Peace in the Central African Republic, which is considered a terrorist organization by the government, along a raft of other accusations including undermining the security of the state.
Since his arrest, the Central African government has repeatedly stated it has substantial evidence against him. If that’s the case, the government should respect his right to trial without undue delay, a key element of the right to a fair and public trial before an independent and impartial court. As the United Nations Human Rights Committee has underscored, the right to a speedy trial serves to avoid uncharged people being held for prolonged periods in detention, and if bail is not provided then the trial must be as expeditious as possible.
One year on his family is desperately seeking to move his case forward, convinced he can explain the evidence against him and resolute that he was in the country to help the Central African Republic, not destabilize it. Only in court will the truth be established. It is time for the authorities to end his prolonged detention without trial and ensure due process takes its course.
If the authorities don’t have enough evidence to bring this case to trial—and they’ve had more than a year to gather it—they should let Joe go.
Libya: Barriers to Justice
(Beirut) – Libya’s fragmented justice sector is suppressing fundamental freedoms and obstructing accountability for abuses, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Libyan authorities should urgently pursue sweeping judicial overhaul, reform repressive legislation, and arrest and surrender suspects on its territory wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC).
June 2, 2025 Injustice By DesignThe 39-page report, “Injustice By Design: Need for Comprehensive Justice Reform in Libya,” documents how outdated and repressive legislation, lack of fair trial rights, and rampant due process violations urgently need reform. Unsafe conditions for judicial staff, abusive military trials of civilians, and inhumane conditions in prisons compound abuses and entrench impunity.
“By failing to address long-standing judicial reform needs, Libyan authorities are turning their back on justice and letting impunity prevail,” said Hanan Salah, associate Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “Recent deadly militia clashes in the capital, Tripoli, and the lack of adequate justice mechanisms to address abuses and violations should be a wake-up call for urgent reform.”
Libya’s tumultuous political transition remains stalled as two rival entities compete for control of territory and resources amid rising repression and armed confrontations. The Tripoli-based Government of National Unity (GNU) together with affiliated armed groups and security agencies control most of western Libya, while the Libyan Arab Armed Forces, their affiliated security apparatuses, and an administrative entity control eastern and southern Libya. The Presidential Council operates out of Tripoli and is backed by armed groups.
Recent violence and the discovery of a new mass grave underscore the need for judicial accountability, Human Rights Watch said. Heavy fighting between armed groups and quasi-state forces in the Libyan capital between May 12-14, 2025, resulted in civilian casualties and the destruction of homes and cars. After the clashes, GNU authorities said they discovered 53 unidentified bodies in a hospital morgue and a previously unknown unmarked grave site containing at least nine unidentified bodies of men and women.
Human Rights Watch found that Libya’s justice sector is marked by fragmentation and deep political polarization. The judiciary is unwilling and unable to conduct meaningful investigations into serious violations and international crimes.
Key judicial institutions, including the Ministry of Justice, the Supreme Judicial Council, the Supreme Court, and the Prosecutor General’s Office, are in deep conflict. A newly established Supreme Constitutional Court in Benghazi may compete with the Supreme Court in Tripoli, risking a constitutional crisis and conflicting rulings.
Libya’s penal code and related legislation are outdated, do not address international crimes, and require comprehensive reform to bring them in line with its international human rights obligations. Domestic legislation includes repressive and abusive provisions from the era of former leader Muammar Gaddafi, including laws providing for the death penalty, lashings, and amputation of limbs. Many laws issued since 2011 limit freedoms and contravene international law.
Fair trial and due process rights are not respected in Libya. Military courts in the east and west continue to prosecute civilians under the guise of “terrorism” related crimes. Lawyers face barriers to meeting with clients, a lack of notice around hearing schedules, and a lack of access to court documents. Video hearings are increasingly common and undermine detainees’ rights when used exclusively.
Both Libyans and non-Libyans are routinely held in long-term arbitrary detention. Armed groups and quasi-state forces control detention facilities notorious for inhumane conditions for migrants, asylum seekers, and Libyan nationals alike. They do not always comply with release orders and court summonses of detainees. Torture, ill-treatment, and overcrowding are rampant and well-documented.
Legal professionals, defendants, and witnesses in Libya have faced attacks, intimidation, and harassment as the authorities do not provide them with adequate physical protection.
The United Nations Security Council referred the situation in Libya to the ICC prosecutor in 2011 and the Office of the Prosecutor opened an investigation into serious international crimes committed in Libya since February 15, 2011. Eight people subject to public ICC arrest warrants remain at large.
Libyan authorities should cooperate with the ICC, including by promptly arresting and surrendering to the court everyone on Libyan territory subject to ICC arrest warrants, such as Saif al-Islam Gaddafi and Osama Elmasry Njeem, both wanted for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
In November 2023, the ICC prosecutor announced that his office planned “to complete investigative activities” in the Libya situation by the end of 2025. On May 12, 2025, the Libyan government submitted a declaration to the ICC accepting the court’s jurisdiction over alleged crimes committed in Libya from 2011 to the end of 2027. The Office of the Prosecutor should reassess the time frame for completion to ensure the adequate delivery of its mandate. The office should also engage with Libyan authorities to strengthen the domestic criminal justice system by addressing structural deficiencies, Human Rights Watch said.
International law requires states to provide a fair hearing before a legally constituted, competent, independent, and impartial judicial body, a trial without undue delay, and a right to appeal to a higher judicial body. Defendants must be granted full access to a lawyer, adequate time to prepare their defense, and the ability to challenge evidence and arguments against them.
Detention is subject to strict due process and authorities must promptly charge or release a person, promptly present them before a judge to rule on the legality of detention, and provide regular opportunities to challenge the lawfulness of detention. Trying civilians in military courts is incompatible with the right to a fair trial under international human rights law.
Libyan authorities should repeal all laws that violate international law and Libya’s Constitutional Declaration. They should lay the groundwork for comprehensive legislative reform in consultation with legal scholars and domestic and international civic groups, amend the penal code to criminalize grave international crimes, ensure fair trial standards and due process rights, assume genuine control over all detention facilities, ensure humane treatment of detainees, release all those held in arbitrary detention, and end military trials of civilians.
“Violations of the magnitude and persistence we are documenting in Libya do not occur in a vacuum, but rather reflect the chronic shortcomings of Libya’s judicial institutions,” Salah said. “Tackling the structural institutional dysfunction, including within the judiciary, is a prerequisite to overcoming impunity.”
Gulf States: Protect Workers from Extreme Heat
(Beirut) – Gulf Cooperation Council countries are exposing migrant workers to yet another deadly summer of extreme heat conditions without adequate protection, Human Rights Watch said today. The countries ignore the scientific evidence on the limitations of calendar-based midday work bans to shield workers from heat-related health risks.
“Every summer reveals that the climate crisis aggravates the occupational health and safety catastrophe for the millions of migrant workers dangerously exposed to extreme heat in the Gulf states,” said Michael Page, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “Because Gulf states are dragging their feet on evidence-based labor protections, migrant workers are unnecessarily dying, experiencing kidney failure, and suffering from other chronic illnesses.”
From July 2024 to May 2025, Human Rights Watch interviewed 19 migrant workers based in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, and Kuwait. Human Rights Watch also interviewed hundreds of workers in 2023 and 2024 on extreme heatrisks.
One notable reform during this past year was Bahrain’s 2025 cabinet decision to extend the summer midday bans to three months, from June 15 to September 15, instead of July 1 to August 31. While the decision is positive, it only brings Bahrain’s policy into line with other Gulf states.
Calendar-based bans are insufficient as extreme heat occurs outside the hours or months when the ban is in effect. A study found that the highest heat intensity for workers in Saudi Arabia was from 9 a.m. to noon, while the ban is in effect between noon and 3 p.m., and that workers employed by companies complying with the work ban still experienced high heat exposure. Another study, in Kuwait, found a substantial increase in the risk of occupational injuries associated with extremely hot temperatures, despite the ban.
In May 2025, Dubai recorded its highest temperature two days in a row, reaching 51.6 degrees Celsius (124.88 Fahrenheit), breaking its previous record of 50.2 degrees Celsius (122.36 degrees Fahrenheit) set in 2009. There were similar reports in Kuwait.
These extreme heat conditions are now more frequent and earlier, in May. The midday ban in the UAE, Kuwait, and others comes into effect only from June 15. Temperatures have also soared in Saudi Arabia and Oman.
A former Saudi-based construction worker said that they adjusted work schedules during summer months to start at 4 a.m. “By 8 a.m., it got very hot but by 10, it was unbearable,” he said.
His employer deducted wages if workers were caught resting during work hours and two days’ wages for every workday missed. “During my two years in Saudi Arabia, my wages were deducted twice when I was caught resting,” he said.” During midday bans, we slept at the rest area but there was no AC or refrigerator for our food, which often went bad. However, we had access to cold water.”
Extreme heat exposure is a serious health hazard. It can cause heat rash, cramps, heat exhaustion, or heat stroke, which can be fatal or have lifelong consequences, such as end-stage renal failure.
A Saudi-based worker said he had three nosebleeds in the summer of 2024, “My nose bled more this year than previous years,” he said. “Once you go to a shaded area and rest, the bleeding stops. When it bleeds too much, you cannot work.”
A Kuwait-based electrician said: “I feel dizziness, vomiting, head pain, and blurry vision many times. Many people fall down because of heat. Not only people, but you can also see birds dropping dead while flying because of heat … In construction sites, workers sometimes fall or faint. I too fainted several times two years ago when I worked in an airport runway line.”
Instead of calendar-based midday bans, which experts have described as a “minimum necessity” until more robust measures are introduced, governments and businesses should use risk-based measures such as the widely used Wet Bulb Globe Temperature (WBGT) index, which measures occupational heat stress based on air temperature and relative humidity.
Only Qatar, in 2021, has introduced the index and even then only as an upper threshold of 32.1 degrees Celsius (89.78 degree Fahrenheit) to stop outdoor work, but the threshold is too high and enforcement gaps remain. Even wet bulb temperatures between 30 to 32 degrees Celsius have resulted in severe heat strain in humans, according to a recent academic study.
Workers’ ability to rest, rehydrate, and recover from heat exposure depends on, among others things, access to shaded rest areas, cold water, proper nutrition, air-conditioned accommodations, and transportation services, Human Rights Watch has documented.
Problems in worker accommodations include long wait times to use kitchens and bathrooms, the absence of cold water for a shower, and delayed company responses to repair broken air conditioning in crowded migrant worker rooms. A Saudi-based worker said, “It feels like we are waking up tired and taking an exhausted body to work.”
Some occupation-specific factors can make workers over-exert themselves. Two Kuwait-based delivery drivers – a bike rider and a car driver – said it is hard to meet their monthly delivery targets, without which their salaries are reduced. Heat makes the work particularly difficult for bike riders as phones turn off in extreme heat, heat mirages make the road appear blurry, and tires melt.
“In the last month, I fell down twice,” the bike rider said. “When 49-degree hot air hits your face how do you feel? I compare my job … with a desert camel. We don’t have any option. We have to drink water and run.” He welcomed Kuwait’s extension of midday work bans for bike riders from June 1 and said: ”I wish delivery targets were also reduced because it will be further challenging to meet them as all bike riders will now take up the evening and night shifts.”
Human Rights Watch has written to all six Gulf states about their heat protection plans. The UAE emphasized the high compliance of the midday work ban by companies and penalties for non-compliance without addressing queries regarding strengthening the policy itself. The other countries did not provide substantive responses.
Immediate steps the Gulf states can take include adopting risk-based, cost-effective heat protection measures such as the WBGT with appropriate thresholds based on work intensity to impose evidence-based work-rest schedules, ensuring access to water, and providing shaded rest areas.
Evidence indicates that there is also a robust “business case” for better heat protections as they enable support workers to be more productive, safer, and healthier, Human Rights Watch said.
The bans or restrictions on trade unions in Gulf states, along with severe limitations on free expression and access to worksites, undermines the strong coalition needed between policymakers, occupational health professionals, employers, civil society, worker representatives, and trade unions to achieve critical worker protections, including extreme heat risks.
“Gulf states have the capacity and expertise to play a leading role on the global issue of heat protection instead of enforcing a reality where experts self-censor and migrant workers fear losing their livelihoods if they speak up about risks that could cost them their lives,” Page said.
The following table is adapted from Migrant-Rights.org.
GCC StateMidday Ban Hours and Ban DatesPenalty for ViolationsLegislationPenaltyBahrain12:00 - 4:00 pm between June 15-September 15"a. Prison sentence for a period not exceeding three months.Ministerial Decision No. 3 of 2013
Penalty in Article 192 of the Labor Lawb. Fine of no less than 500 Bahraini Dinars and not exceeding 1,000 Bahrain Dinars or by either penalty."Cabinet Decision on Sept 2024 to extend the ban to three months from June 15, 2025.Kuwait11:00 am – 4:00 pm from June 1- August 31"a. Violators shall be warned that they should remedy their violation within a period that shall be specified by the Ministry, provided that such period shall not exceed three months.Ministerial Decision No. 189/L of 2012, amended by Ministerial Decision No. 212/L of 2012Penalty in Article 141 of the Labor Lawb. In the event where the violator does not remedy the violation within the specified period, he shall be subject to a fine of not less than 100 Kuwaiti Dinars, and not more than 200 Kuwaiti Dimar for each of the workers who are involved in the violation. In the event of repeated violation within three years from the date of the final judgment, the punishment shall be doubled."Oman12:30 pm – 3:30 pm from June 1 – August 31"a. A fine of R.O. 500/-. The fine may be doubled according to the number of Women Jeureniles employed in violation the provisions.Ministerial Decision No. (286) of 2008,Penalty in Article 118 of the Labor Lawb. If the same incident is repeated after one year of the the employer may be subject to maximum of one month imprisonment in addition to the fine."Amended by Ministerial Decision No. 322 of 2011Qatar
10:00 am – 3:30 pm from June 1 – September 15
Outdoor work is prohibited when the Wet Bulb Globe Temperature (WBGT) exceeds 32.1 degree Celsius.
Kyrgyzstan: Whistleblower Convicted for Exposing Corruption in Court System
(Bishkek, May 30, 2025) – A Kyrgyz court on May 27, 2025, convicted former National Academy of Sciences researcher and whistleblower, Zhoomart Karabaev, of “incitement of mass disorder” and calling for disobedience to authorities, sentencing him to three years’ probation, Human Rights Watch said today. Karabaev was prosecuted in retaliation for his social media posts alleging the systematic fabrication of expert evidence for criminal trials. Karabaev’s lawyers said they would appeal the conviction.
Karabaev, a 27-year-old linguistics expert, was detained in July 2024 after posting allegations on Facebook claiming that prosecutors systematically use fabricated expert conclusions in cases against government critics. Authorities then used the posts as alleged evidence of the two offences with which he was charged; prosecutors initially sought seven years in prison.
“Karabaev’s posts exposed a practice that would indicate corruption at the heart of what is supposed to be a system of fair trial, which deserves an independent, effective investigation in response, leading to full accountability,” said Syinat Sultanalieva, Central Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “It is outrageous that, instead, authorities prosecuted and punished the messenger, a chilling sign of how far the state will go to crackdown on free speech and opposing views.”
Karabaev’s conviction is the latest in a series of incidents that point to corruption in the judicial system, exactly what Karabaev was trying to expose.
In Kyrgyzstan, investigators routinely task linguistic experts with analyzing public statements, interviews, social media posts, and news to conclude whether the material contains elements of incitement to mass disorder, interethnic hate, or calls to violent seizure of power, conclusions that are subsequently used as evidence in court. These are the most common charges that journalists, activists, lawyers, and political opposition members have faced in the past three years; during their trials, such semantic analysis is often the main—if not the only—evidence used to convict them.
However, Karabaev publicly called this into question by alleging that the National Academy of Sciences uses no established methodology or clearly developed criteria when judicially ordered to provide such analyses; instead, academy experts are required to sign statements prepared in advance by the state prosecution or State Committee on National Security (SCNS). He also called out his former academy colleague, Azamat Zhanishbek Uulu, for signing a pre-written conclusion claiming that writer Olzhobay Shakir had committed “incitement” in posts Shakir made publicly disagreeing with the transfer of ownership of several national resorts to Uzbekistan. Based on Zhanishbek Uulu’s signed statement, Shakir was subsequently sentenced to five years in prison, which was later modified to three years’ probation.
Zhanishbek Uulu has signed expert analyses in at least seven high-profile cases against government critics, activists, and journalists, consistently finding evidence of incitement or extremism. He was also one of three experts who issued conclusions incriminating defendants in a case involving 11 journalists associated with Temirov.Live, an investigative journalism outlet. Four journalists were found guilty, with two sentenced to six and five years in prison respectively, and the others to three years’ probation. The journalist sentenced to six years was pardoned in April 2025 by presidential order.
In an outrageous violation of fair process, the prosecution requested that Zhanishbek Uulu provide expert linguistic analysis of Karabaev’s posts, which Zhanishbek Uulu found to contain elements of incitement.
Karabaev had been dismissed in 2023 from his position at the National Academy of Sciences, when he refused to alter his court-ordered expert linguistic analysis to suit the prosecution and instead issued a conclusion contrary to what the prosecution sought. The academy subsequently dismissed him for allegedly “disclosing state secrets.”
Kyrgyzstan’s authorities should immediately seek dismissal of Karabaev’s conviction on the basis of charges that should never have been brought in the first place. They should investigate the allegations of expert testimony manipulation, stop using so-called semantic analysis, which proves neither the actus reus or mens rea as evidence of criminal conduct in speech offences, respect and ensure judicial independence, and end the arbitrary prosecutions of government critics. Kyrgyzstan’s international partners should press Kyrgyz authorities to uphold their human rights obligations and restore respect for fundamental freedoms.
“This case exposes how Kyrgyzstan's authorities weaponize the justice system against critics,” Sultanalieva said. “Until the government stops manipulating courts and expert testimony, no one who speaks truth to power is safe.”