US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, June 4, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 4, 2026.
The global human rights system is in peril. Under relentless pressure from US President Donald Trump, and persistently undermined by China and Russia, the rules-based international order is being crushed, threatening to take with it the architecture human rights defenders have come to rely on to advance norms and protect freedoms. To defy this trend, governments that still value human rights, alongside social movements, civil society, and international institutions, need to form a strategic alliance to push back.
To be fair, the downward spiral predated Trump’s reelection. The democratic wave that began over 50 years ago has given way to what scholars term a “democratic recession.” Democracy is now back to 1985 levels according to some metrics, with 72 percent of the world’s population now living under autocracy. Russia and China are less free today than 20 years ago. And so is the United States.
Of course, democracy is not a panacea for human rights violations; the US and other longtime democracies have their own histories of colonial crimes, racism, abusive justice systems, and wartime atrocities. More recently, authoritarian leaders have exploited public mistrust and anger to win elections and then dismantled the very institutions that brought them to power. Democratic institutions are crucial to represent the will of the people and keep power in check. It’s no surprise that whenever democracy is undermined, rights are too, as evident in recent years in India, Türkiye, the Philippines, El Salvador, and Hungary.
FIRST: The Momentum Movement’s parliamentary representative David Bedo and independent member of parliament Akos Hadhazy protest against a law that bans Pride marches in Hungary and imposes fines on organizers and attendees of such events, Budapest, June 4, 2026. © 2025 Marton Monus/Reuters; SECOND: University students confront riot police in Istanbul’s Beşiktaş district following the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, June 4, 2026. © 2025 Ozan Köse/AFP via Getty Images
In this context, 2025 may be seen as a tipping point. In just 12 months, the Trump administration has carried out a broad assault on key pillars of US democracy and the global rules-based order, which the US, despite inconsistencies, was, with other states, instrumental in helping to establish.
In short order, Trump’s second-term administration has undermined trust in the sanctity of elections, reduced government accountability, gutted food assistance and healthcare subsidies, attacked judicial independence, defied court orders, rolled back women’s rights, obstructed access to abortion care, undermined remedies for racial harm, terminated programs mandating accessibility for people with disabilities, punished free speech, stripped protections from trans and intersex people, eroded privacy, and used government power to intimidate political opponents, the media, law firms, universities, civil society, and even comedians.
Claiming a risk of “civilizational erasure” in Europe and leaning on racist tropes to cast entire populations as unwelcome in the US, the Trump administration has embraced policies and rhetoric that align with white nationalist ideology. Immigrants and asylum seekers have been subjected to inhumane conditions and degrading treatment; 32 died in US Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody in 2025, and as of mid-January 2026, an additional 4 have died. Masked immigration enforcement agents have targeted people of color, using excessive force, terrorizing communities, wrongfully arresting scores of citizens, and, most recently, unjustifiably killing two people in Minneapolis, whose deaths Human Rights Watch has documented.
The US president of course has the authority to tighten US borders and enforce stricter immigration policies. The administration is not, however, entitled to deny legal process to asylum seekers, mistreat undocumented migrants, or unlawfully discriminate. In a well-functioning democracy, no electoral mandate should supersede domestic legislation, constitutional protections, or international human rights law. Trump’s team has repeatedly bypassed these guardrails.
The violations have not stopped at the border. The Trump administration used a 1798 law to send hundreds of Venezuelan migrants to an infamous prison in El Salvador, where they were tortured and sexually abused. Its blatantly unlawful strikes on boats in the Caribbean and the Pacific extrajudicially killed more than 120 people whom Trump claims were drug traffickers.
US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, June 4, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 4, 2026.
After the US attacked Venezuela and apprehended its president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, Trump claimed the US would “run” the country and control its vast oil reserves. Despite paying lip service to human rights concerns under Maduro at the United Nations, Trump has worked with the same repressive apparatus to further US interests. Many Western allies have chosen to stay silent about these lawless moves, perhaps fearing erratic tariffs and blowback to their alliances.
Trump’s foreign policy has upended the foundations of the rules-based order that seeks to advance democracy and human rights, even if imperfectly.
Trump has boasted that he doesn’t “need international law” as a constraint, only his “own morality.” His administration has politicized the US State Department’s annual human rights report, stepped away from the global prohibition on antipersonnel landmines, voiced support for rewriting international rules on asylum, and skipped the UN’s Universal Periodic Review of the US’ human rights record.
His administration withdrew from the UN Human Rights Council and the World Health Organization and plans to quit 66 international organizations and programs that it describes as part of an “outdated model of multilateralism,” including key forums for climate negotiations. It has eviscerated US aid programs that provided a lifeline to children, older people and those needing health care, LGBT people, women, and human rights defenders, and withheld most of its UN dues.
Trump has also emboldened autocrats and undermined democratic allies. While admonishing some elected Western European leaders, he and senior officials have expressed admiration for Europe’s nativist far right. He has favored autocrats such as Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Türkiye’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele, while continuing decades of US support to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.
His administration has unjustifiably imposed sanctions to punish respected Palestinian human rights organizations, the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) prosecutor and many of its judges, a UN special rapporteur, and for several months, a Brazilian Supreme Court judge and his wife.
The institutional response in the US to Trump’s power grabs has been shockingly muted. Much of Congress, controlled by his own party, has not challenged his supercharged expansion of executive power. The leaders of the US’ most powerful technology companies have made significant donations and sought to placate the president. Some big law firms and prestigious universities have made deals rather than assert their independence, and some media organizations seem afraid to attract the president’s ire.
Has the US switched sides on the human rights playing field? While US engagement with human rights institutions has always been selective, China and Russia have long pursued an illiberal agenda. They stand much to gain from a US government that now expresses open hostility to universal rights. China and Russia remain strategic rivals of the US, but all three countries are now led by leaders who share open disdain for norms and institutions that could constrain their power.
Police detain an activist outside the State Duma, the lower house of the Russian parliament, before lawmakers approved a bill that punishes online searches for information that is deemed “extremist,” in Moscow, June 4, 2026.
Together, they wield considerable economic, military, and diplomatic power. If they were to consistently act as allies of convenience to erode global rules, they could threaten the entire system. Already, a loose international network of countries such as North Korea, Iran, Venezuela, Myanmar, Cuba, and Belarus work in concert with Russia and China. These leaders share very little ideologically but align in undermining human rights and promoting a regressive international agenda. In word and in practice, the US government is now helping them in this endeavor.
FIRST: Surveillance cameras installed in Lhasa, Tibet Autonomous Region, June 4, 2026. © 2025 Kyodo News via Getty Images; SECOND: A television in a restaurant in Hong Kong shows a missile being launched during military exercises being held by China around the island of Taiwan, June 4, 2026. © 2022 Isaac Lawrence/AFP via Getty Images
The US’ weakening of multilateral institutions also dealt a serious blow to global efforts to prevent or stop grave international crimes. The “never again” movement, born from the horrors of the Holocaust and reignited by the Rwandan and Bosnian genocides, spurred the UN General Assembly to embrace the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) in 2005. Meant to guide international intervention to prevent and stop atrocities in tandem with efforts to prosecute and punish serious crimes, R2P made a real difference in places like the Central African Republic and Kenya.
Today, R2P is rarely invoked and the ICC is under siege. In addition to Trump’s far-reaching sanctions, in December 2025 a Moscow court sentenced the ICC prosecutor and eight of its judges to prison terms in absentia. Moreover, despite being ICC fugitives, in 2025, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin was welcomed by Donald Trump in Alaska, and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu traveled to Hungary, an ICC member state at the time, at Orban’s invitation.
Twenty years ago, the US government and civil society were instrumental in galvanizing a response to mass atrocities in Darfur. Sudan is burning again, but this time under Trump, with relative impunity. Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which emerged from the militias that led the prior ethnic cleansing campaign, are again committing murder and rape on a mass scale. A growing body of evidence indicates that the UAE, a longtime US ally that recently made multi-billion-dollar deals with Trump, is providing the RSF with military support.
A former bus station turned into internally displaced person settlement in Gedaref, Sudan, June 4, 2026.
In the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the Israeli armed forces have committed acts of genocide, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity, killing over 70,000 people since the October 2023 Hamas-led attacks on Israel and displacing the vast majority of Gaza’s population. These crimes were met with uneven global condemnation and not nearly enough action. Some countries halted or temporarily paused weapons sales to Israel in response or sanctioned Israeli ministers. Trump, however, continued a long-standing US policy of almost unconditional support to Israel, even as the International Court of Justice is weighing allegations of genocide and has issued binding orders under the Genocide Convention to protect Palestinians’ rights.
Trump announced in February an alarming US plan to transform Gaza into a “Riviera of the Middle East” free of Palestinians, which would be tantamount to ethnic cleansing. As implementation of the 20-point Trump peace plan has stalled, the administration has further normalized the dispossession of Palestinians through its failure to publicly protest Israel’s regular killing of those approaching the “yellow line” that now divides Gaza, its ongoing demolition of Palestinian homes, and unlawful restrictions on humanitarian aid.
FIRST: A Palestinian girl stands amidst rubble in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip, June 4, 2026. © 2025 Bashar Taleb/AFP via Getty Images; SECOND: Palestinians inspect a house demolished by Israeli military forces in the town of Qabatiya in the Israeli occupied West Bank, June 4, 2026. © 2025 Nasser Ishtayeh/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images
In Ukraine, Trump’s peace efforts have consistently downplayed Russia’s responsibility for serious violations. These include indiscriminate bombing, coercing Ukrainians in occupied areas to serve in the Russian military, systematic torture of Ukrainian prisoners of war, the abduction and deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia, and the use of quadcopter drones to hunt and kill civilians. Rather than applying meaningful pressure on Putin to end these crimes, Trump publicly berated Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in a made-for-TV dressing down, demanded an exploitative mineral deal, pressured Ukraine’s authorities to concede large swaths of territory, and proposed “full amnesty” for war crimes.
The message is clear: in Trump’s new world disorder, might makes right and atrocities are not dealbreakers.
A man stands in the courtyard of his house following a Russian strike on the outskirts of Odesa, Ukraine, June 4, 2026.
예명을 카리나로 지은 이유는 천주교 세례명이 카타리나이기 때문이라고하며 예명 후보에 올랐던 이름으로는 우아, 자스민, 지온 등이 있었다고 합니다. 2016년도 카리나가 한솔고등학교 1학년 재학중에 촬영한 희귀영상 및 연습생 시절의. 이날 서장훈은 카리나에게 원래 sns 스타 아니었냐며 dm으로 캐스팅됐다던데. 인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm엔터테인먼트 캐스팅 제안을 받았습니다.
처음 소속사에서 캐스팅 제의가 왔을 때 사기꾼인 줄 알고 부모님과. Sm 에스파 카리나유지민 과거 논란 폭로한 사람은 예명 미리 알았다. 그리고 멤버들의 숙소, 취미 생활도 공개된다고 하네요. 23일 방송된 jtbc 예능프로그램 ‘아는형님’에는 그룹 에스파가 출연했다.인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm엔터테인먼트 캐스팅 제안을. 오늘은 카리나가 학교를 자퇴한 이유와 과사 과거사진에 대해 알아보려고 한다. 고향은 경기도 수원시 팔달구 지동이며, 이후 학창시절은 분당에서 보낸 것으로 알려졌다, Sm 담당자가 dm으로 연락이 와서 캐스팅 되었다고 합니다. 시간 때우는 페이지 원본 여기 👉syout.
카메라 테스트까지 진행했지만 담당자가 퇴사하면서 상황이 중단됐습니다. Dm으로만 2번 캐스팅이 돼서 결국 회사에 들어갔다라고 캐스팅 비화를 밝혔다. 나 추정 좋아하네 이거 저장하고 매일 봐야지 그럼 다음에 더 많은 도파민으로 찾아올게요 byeeeeee 카리나과사 카리나과거사진 카리나과거 카리나나이 카리나배경화면 카리나사진 카리나인스타 유지민사진 유지민 카리나 에스파 카리나셀카 닝닝 윈터.
과거 간호사 집안에서 보컬 학원을 다니며 아이돌 꿈을 키워가던 중 인스타 dm을 통해 캐스팅 제의를 받은 것을 계기로 sm엔터 연습생이 되었고, 45년간의 연습 끝에 걸그룹 에스파로 데뷔하였으며, 가수 활동 외에도 비주얼 및 몸매로도 많은 사랑을 받고 있는 에스파 카리나에 대해 알아보았습니다, 가수 에스파 멤버 카리나에 대해 알아볼게요, 카리나는 나도 처음엔 사기꾼인 줄 알았다고 답했다.
과거 일반인 시절 인스타그램 팔로워가 많은 편이었고, dm을 통해 캐스팅 제안을 받았습니다.. 인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm엔터테인먼트 캐스팅 제안을 받았습니다.. 고향은 경기도 수원시 팔달구 지동이며, 이후 학창시절은 분당에서 보낸 것으로 알려졌다..
| 01 메뉴 더보기 더보기 up down1 댓글 맨위로. | 에스파 카리나 본명 유지민 과거사진 졸업사진 에스크 인스타. | 에스파 카리나 인스타 여친모드 출처 출처 아시면 dm 부탁합니다 출처제보 dm 부탁드립니다 에스파 카리나. | Com › 202에스파 카리나 본명 유지민 과거사진 졸업사진 에스크 인스타 과사 모. |
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| 아이돌인스타 dm으로 sm에 캐스팅된 에스파 카리나 중학생 때 사진 20210616 1642. | 엔터톡 학원출신인지 방금 앎 ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ 애초에 자기가 초딩때부터 연옌이 꿈이었댔고 dm캐스팅이라는 방법 자체가 ㅈㄴ 이상하긴 했는데 그래도 본인이 당당하게 말해서 믿었음ㅠ 저거보. | 한솔고에 재학 중이던 카리나는 눈부신 미모로 일반인 기준 많은 sns 팔로워를 보유 중이었는데요. | 카리나 카리나는 본명 유지민 劉知珉훈음, yu jimin으로 대한민국 경기도 수원시 출생하여 2000년 4월 11일 출생하여 23세입니다. |
| 2,470 likes, 15 comments idolissue on ma dm으로 캐스팅될 만 했던 에스파 카리나 데뷔 전 사진들 카리나 카리나데뷔전 카리나과거사진 에스파카리나과사 카리나과사 카리나과거 karina 에스파 aespa 에스파카리나 아이돌 kpop kpopidol idol idolissue 아이. | 과거 일반인 기준 팔로워가 많은 인스타그램 인기인이였지만, 인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm으로 캐스팅되었습니다. | 과거 일반인 기준으로 많은 인스타그램 팔로워를 보유했었다. | 가수 에스파 멤버 카리나에 대해 알아볼게요. |
| Net › name_enter › 91158979마플 카리나 남미새라서 데뷔전에도 여럿 잘생남한테 인스타 디엠. | 8cm, b형 가족 부모, 언니1995년생 학력 성남신기. | 인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm엔터테인먼트 캐스팅 제안을 받았습니다. | 카리나는 과거 중딩시절에 인스타팔로워 3000명 이었던 인스타그램 스타였음 근데 공개한 dm에 만나자는 얘기가 없는데 작성자 뇌피셜 아니냐고 논란. |
| 아이돌인스타 dm으로 sm에 캐스팅된 에스파 카리나 중학생 때 사진 20210616 1642. | 그녀의 과거사진을 보면 dm으로 캐스팅 당한것이 맞나. | Sm 엔터테인먼트의 전폭적인 지지를 받으면서 2020년 11월 17일에 데뷔한 에스파, 그 중에서도 오늘은 에스파의 리더인 카리나의 과사과거사진을 찾아보고 포스팅 해보려고 합니다. | 카리나 데뷔전 과거 연기 영상, 고등학교 시절 희귀영상성형. |
25일 sm은 소셜네트워크서비스를 통해 그룹 에스파 카리나, 라이즈 원빈, nct 도쿄 시온이 함께 찍은 사진을 공개했다, 지난 17일 데뷔한 sm 엔터테인먼트 신인 걸그룹 에스파 aespa 멤버인 카리나의 과거 인성이 네티즌들 사이에서 재조명됐다. 처음 소속사에서 캐스팅 제의가 왔을 때. 인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm엔터테인먼트 캐스팅 제안을 받았습니다. 에스파 카리나 인스타 여친모드 출처 출처 아시면 dm 부탁합니다 출처제보 dm 부탁드립니다 에스파 카리나.
과거 일반인 기준 팔로워가 많은 인스타그램 인기인이였지만, 인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm으로 캐스팅되었습니다, 인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm엔터테인먼트 캐스팅 제안을. 카리나는 과거 팔로워가 많은 인스타그램 스타였다. 이날 서장훈은 카리나에게 원래 sns 스타 아니었냐며 dm으로 캐스팅됐다던데.
카리나 데뷔전 과거 연기 영상, 고등학교 시절 희귀영상성형, Com › killingtimeee5 › posts시간 때우는 페이지 육상 카리나 김민지 충격적인 과거 사진 공개, 카리나는 나도 처음엔 사기꾼인 줄 알았다고 답했다.
2016년도 카리나가 한솔고등학교 1학년 재학중에 촬영한 희귀영상 및 연습생 시절의, 에스파 멤버 카리나는 인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm엔터테인먼트에 캐스팅된 일화로 유명하다, 에스파 카리나 본명 유지민 과거사진 졸업사진 에스크 인스타.
23일 방송된 jtbc 예능프로그램 ‘아는형님’에는 그룹 에스파가 출연했다. 에스파 멤버 카리나는 인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm엔터테인먼트에 캐스팅된 일화로 유명하다. 예명을 카리나로 지은 이유는 천주교 세례명이 카타리나이기 때문이라고하며 예명 후보에 올랐던 이름으로는 우아, 자스민, 지온 등이 있었다고 합니다, 카리나 에스파 프로필 & 가상인터뷰 본명, 나이, 소속사, 출신, 과거 이야기 카리나 에스파 기본프로필 정보본명 유지민 劉知珉 훈음, yu jimin생년월일 2000년 4월 11일 2024년 현재 24세출신 경기도 수원시 팔달구 지동, 출신 경기도 성남시 분당구 정자동소속사 sm엔터테인먼트학력 성남, 에스파 카리나가 캐스팅 비하인드 스토리를 공개했다. 처음 소속사에서 캐스팅 제의가 왔을 때.
Com › 202에스파 카리나 본명 유지민 과거사진 졸업사진 에스크 인스타 과사 모. 카리나 위버스 디엠, 카리나 통통, 카리나 과거사진 합성, 에스파 멤버들과 한강 먹방을 보여준다고 합니다. 카리나의 과거와 디엠 캐스팅 비화, 인스타에서의 미모와 매력적 비주얼을 확인해보세요. 처음에 사기꾼인 줄 알았다 에스파 멤버 카리나가 dm을.
ok.porn 2016년도 카리나가 한솔고등학교 1학년 재학중에 촬영한 희귀영상 및 연습생 시절의. 카리나 데뷔전 과거 연기 영상, 고등학교 시절 희귀영상성형. Com › killingtimeee5 › posts시간 때우는 페이지 육상 카리나 김민지 충격적인 과거 사진 공개. 에스파는 2020년 11월 17일에 데뷔한 sm 엔터테인먼트의. 오늘은 카리나가 학교를 자퇴한 이유와 과사 과거사진에 대해 알아보려고 한다. pecpal sotwe
oyasumitsuki pikpak 카리나의 과거와 디엠 캐스팅 비화, 인스타에서의 미모와 매력적 비주얼을 확인해보세요. 이날 서장훈은 카리나에게 원래도 sns 스타였다고 들었다. 8cm, b형 가족 부모, 언니1995년생 학력 성남신기. 아이돌인스타 dm으로 sm에 캐스팅된 에스파 카리나 중학생 때 사진 20210616 1642. Sm 에스파 카리나 유지민 과거 논란 정리폭로인은 예명을 미리. oyasumitsuki live
patreon yoonying 실제 캐스팅도 인스타그램 dm을 통해 되었다고 알려졌다. 연예 이슈 정보 에스파 카리나 과거 에스크 모음 에스파 카리나 졸업사진 에스파 카리나 과거 인스타그램 계정 카리나는 과거 팔로워가 많은 인스타그램 스타였다. 이날 서장훈은 카리나에게 원래도 sns 스타였다고 들었다. 이후 2020년 11월 첫 싱글 블랙맘바. 카리나 위버스 디엠, 카리나 통통, 카리나 과거사진 합성. oyster 망가
nitter.nt 과거 간호사 집안에서 보컬 학원을 다니며 아이돌 꿈을 키워가던 중 인스타 dm을 통해 캐스팅 제의를 받은 것을 계기로 sm엔터 연습생이 되었고, 45년간의 연습 끝에 걸그룹 에스파로 데뷔하였으며, 가수 활동 외에도 비주얼 및 몸매로도 많은 사랑을 받고 있는 에스파 카리나에 대해 알아보았습니다. 인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm엔터테인먼트 캐스팅 제안을. 가수 에스파 멤버 카리나에 대해 알아볼게요. 그리고 멤버들의 숙소, 취미 생활도 공개된다고 하네요. View all 146 comments.
ntr hentai korean Dm으로 캐스팅될 만 했던 에스파 카리나 데뷔 전. 오늘은 에스파의 리더 카리나에 대하여 알아보겠습니다. 카리나 카리나는 본명 유지민 劉知珉훈음, yu jimin으로 대한민국 경기도 수원시 출생하여 2000년 4월 11일 출생하여 23세입니다. 세 사람은 sm이 소셜네트워크서비스 dm다이렉트 메시지으로. 인스타그램 dm을 통해 sm엔터테인먼트 캐스팅 제안을 받았습니다.
Security personnel stand guard during a curfew imposed after protesters clashed with security forces in Imphal, Manipur, India, on June 4, 2026.
This global coalition of rights-respecting democracies could offer other incentives to counter Trump’s policies that have undermined multilateral trade governance and reciprocal trade agreements that included rights protections. Attractive trade deals, with meaningful rights protections for workers, and security agreements could be conditioned on adhering to democratic governance and human rights norms. Democracy already comes with benefits. While autocracies have generally fostered conflict, economic stagnation, or kleptocracy, as evidenced in multiple academic studies, including the work of the Nobel Prize-winning economist Daron Acemoglu, democratic institutions reliably yield economic growth.
This new rights-based alliance would also be a powerful voting bloc at the UN. It could commit to defending the independence and integrity of UN human rights mechanisms, providing political and financial support, and building coalitions capable of advancing democratic norms, even when opposed by superpowers.
Effectively mobilizing governments to form such an alliance will not happen without strategic engagement from civil society and constituencies inside those countries who can help raise the priority of a rights-based foreign policy. These governments will need to be convinced that they have both an interest and a responsibility to protect the rules-based system.
Projects of this nature are bubbling up. Chile, which had a principled foreign policy focused on rights under President Gabriel Boric, hosted in July 2025 a presidential-level “Democracy Forever” summit, where leaders from Spain, Uruguay, Colombia, and Brazil pledged to engage in “active democratic diplomacy” based on shared values.
The Hague Group, led by Malaysia, South Africa, and Colombia, formed in January 2025 in “defense of international law” and in solidarity with Palestinians. Over 70 countries from all regions signed a joint statement defending multilateralism at the UN. Earlier, in 2017, former Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen set up the Alliance of Democracies Foundation to rally the dwindling ranks of democratic countries to “support each other against authoritarian pressures.”
Whatever its precise contours, an alliance of rights-respecting democracies would offer a hopeful counterpoint to the authoritarian trope of China’s and Russia’s leaders standing alongside North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, observing military hardware in a parade in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in September. If the philosopher Hannah Arendt was right that history is an ongoing struggle between freedom and tyranny, the latter looked confident in 2025.
Yet, even in the worst of times, the idea of freedom and human rights is enduring. People power remains an engine for change. In the US, “No Kings” marches have drawn millions, protesters in Chicago, Minneapolis, Los Angeles, and around the country have stood up against the deployment of the National Guard and ICE abuses, and students are still organizing for Palestine on university campuses despite draconian crackdowns and visa revocations.
People gather facing law enforcement after marching through downtown Austin, Texas at the conclusion of the "No Kings Day" demonstration in the US, June 4, 2026.
Buoyed by popular resistance, South Korean parliamentarians impeached their president to prevent him from grabbing power through martial law. Grassroots aid efforts by Sudan’s emergency response rooms, Hong Kong’s fire relief, Sri Lanka’s cyclone relief community kitchens, and Ukrainian mutual aid and solidarity collectives represent the best of this trend.
In 2025, Gen Z protests against corruption, inadequate public services, and poor governance in Nepal, Indonesia, and Morocco brought to the forefront the need for governments to listen to their youth and tackle corruption and inequality. But as the difficulties of restoring rights in Bangladesh after years under an authoritarian government illustrates, gains won through public mobilization can easily be lost unless democratic participation and free expression remain unassailable.
People take part in a youth-led protest against corruption and calling for education and healthcare reforms, in Rabat, Morocco, June 4, 2026.
Demonstrators outside Nepal's Parliament during a protest in Kathmandu condemning social media prohibitions and corruption by the government, June 4, 2026.
In this more hostile world, civil society is more critical than ever. It’s also increasingly endangered, particularly in an environment where funding is scarce. In 2025, Human Rights Watch was labeled “undesirable” and banned from operating in Russia. For partners in Egypt, Hong Kong, and India, these tactics are all too familiar. Restrictions on civil society and protest have become more commonplace in Europe, including the UK and France. And now, for the first time, many worry about risks associated with their operational presence in the US, where the Open Society Foundations, a major donor, have already been threatened, and the administration is preparing a list of “domestic terrorists” under overbroad guidance that could be interpreted to include the work of many progressive groups.
Breaking the authoritarian wave and standing up for human rights is a generational challenge. In 2026, it will play out most acutely in the US, with far-reaching consequences for the rest of the world. Fighting back will require a determined, strategic, and coordinated reaction from voters, civil society, multilateral institutions, and rights-respecting governments around the globe.
Com › killingtimeee5 › posts시간 때우는 페이지 육상 카리나 김민지 충격적인 과거 사진 공개., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.