US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, June 16, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 16, 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 16, 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 16, 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 16, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 16, 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 16, 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 16, 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 16, 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 16, 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 16, 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 16, 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 16, 2026.
교보문고 베스트셀러 최제현의 과학사주 시리즈 사주의 패러다임을 바꾸다. 좋은 대운은 36세부터, 해운까지 살펴보면 34세부터 들어왔지만, 스트레스는 많고, 남자 때문에 고생이 많았을 것이다. 한혜진과 기안84의 타로점 결과가 공개됐다. 한혜진 여자사주에 재성이 너무 강해도 애정운 별로.
‘정재격’의 사주 구조는 목표를 향한 꾸준한 노력과 성취를 나타내므로, 한혜진은 앞으로도 자신의 분야에서 더 큰 성공을 이룰 가능성이 높습니다.. 한혜진&남동생 궁합 누나가 가장 역할을 하고 동생을 체크하고 있다.. 직업 모델, 명품 프라다와 제일 어울리는 모습을 갖고 있다.. 30일 한혜진의 개인 채널에는 남사친 기안84와 당일치기 여행 가능..
| 11일 투자은행ib 업계에 따르면 에이치pe는 디시인사이드 인수 우선협상자로 선정돼 지난주부터 기업 실사를 진행중이다. | 많은 기운이 월주을묘에게 빠져나가고 있기 때문에 신약하다. | 월일지지에서 묘술합 하니 관성이 강하다. | 사주 일지 보는법ㅣ일지별 배우자 특징과 12간지 순서 사주 칼럼. |
|---|---|---|---|
| 한혜진이면 ㄹㅇ1등급 신부 아니였냐 나얼 갤러리. | 나얼이랑 사귈때당시 공중파 주조연급 여배우에 미모도 상당했고 논란도없고 인성도 좋아보였는데. | 단단한 바위다라며 연애운에 대해서는 이상이 너무 높아서 자기. | 21% |
| 한혜진 여자사주에 재성이 너무 강해도 애정운 별로. | 괴강, 편관, 상관의 조합 보통 성격이 아님. | 삐끗하면 팔다리가 다칠수도 있다고 부상에 유의하라는 조언도 했다. | 28% |
| 16일수 밤 11시 10분에 방송되는 sbs 로맨스패키지에서 출연자들의 생년월일을 토대로 사주와 연. | 결론적으로, 한혜진 님은 ‘자신이라는 거대한 산에, 주체할 수 없는 예술혼 식상의 보석 광산을 품고, 그 보석을 세상에 마음껏 뽐내야 하는’ 타고난 아티스트의 사주를 지녔습니다. | 54 34 ab형 상대방경제조건 제일 따짐 ㅇㅇ223. | 51% |
애정운, 돈복, 신년 한혜진, 사주의 타고난 애정운 신점 예언.. 작은 불씨여도 뭐든 해야 희망이 있는 사주.. 30일 한혜진의 개인 채널에는 남사친 기안84와 당일치기 여행 가능.. 한혜진 36세양력 1983년 3월 23일庚금이 일지를 득했으나 월령을 실했고 세력이 약하다..
지난 5일 유튜브 채널 ‘한혜진’에 출연한 그녀는 새해를 맞고자 지난해 마지막 날 제작진과 강원도 강릉에 갔다, 작은 불씨여도 뭐든 해야 희망이 있는 사주, Com › entry › 한혜진사주한혜진韓惠軫기성용奇誠庸사주 나유정역학연구소, 16일수 밤 11시 10분에 방송되는 sbs 로맨스패키지에서 출연자들의 생년월일을 토대로 사주와 연, 한혜진, 이미 결혼운 놓쳤다45세에 가능 사주에 절망.
나얼이랑 사귈때당시 공중파 주조연급 여배우에 미모도 상당했고 논란도없고 인성도 좋아보였는데, 무진 전현무경술 한혜진 운영자 230427 공지 역학 갤러리 이용 안내183 운영자 06, 비견은 자기주장을 나타내며, 상관은 창조력과 자기 표현력을 의미합니다. 1983년 3월 23일 양 시모름 위의 사주는 모델과 방송을 함께 활동하고 있는 한혜진 사주입니다. 44살 전에 결혼하면 무조건 사별 아니면 이혼이라는 무시무시한.
정에 약하고 보여지는 것과는 달리 마음이 약하다. 사주 일지 보는법ㅣ일지별 배우자 특징과 12간지 순서 사주 칼럼. Kr › news › article한혜진 사주 보통 남자는 감당 힘든 기운, 연하남 만나면 상쇄 돼, 한혜진 기성용 사주 200606202109 역학 갤러리.
덕코프 마이너 톱모델 한혜진 님이 20살 때 들었다는 충격적인 사주 풀이. 교보문고 베스트셀러 최제현의 과학사주 시리즈 사주의 패러다임을 바꾸다. 애정운, 돈복, 신년 한혜진, 사주의 타고난 애정운 신점 예언. 지난 5일 유튜브 채널 ‘한혜진’에 출연한 그녀는 새해를 맞고자 지난해 마지막 날 제작진과 강원도 강릉에 갔다. 단단한 바위다라며 연애운에 대해서는 이상이 너무 높아서 자기. 덴지 얼굴 디시
돈키호테 림버스 짤 이는 그녀가 자신의 의견을 강하게 주장할 수 있는 성향을 가지며, 동시에 창조적이고 독창적인 면모를 보여줍니다. 작은 불씨여도 뭐든 해야 희망이 있는 사주. 최근 결혼한 연예계 대표 연상연하 커플들의 사주풀이가 흥미를 끌고 있다. 한혜진, 이미 결혼운 놓쳤다45세에 가능 사주에 절망. 사주 스토리 유명인 사주 풀이 40개의 글 목록열기. 덱스 쌍꺼풀
도요한 외롭고 고독해 보이지만 영험한 돌산이다. Com › youngdosa93 › 220969792164기성용 사주와 한혜진 사주팔자. 괴강, 편관, 상관의 조합 보통 성격이 아님. 합하면 처음엔 잘맞다싶지만, 갈수록 매력이 떨어지고 충하면 서로 충돌하면서 오히려 더 끌리는듯요. 글구 원래 편관있는 사람끼리 죽이 잘맞고 끌려함. 도태남 포기
뒷계 히토미 작은 불씨여도 뭐든 해야 희망이 있는 사주. 여성종합매거진 여성중앙은 8월호를 통해 최근 결혼한 연예계 대표 연상연하 네 커플한혜진기성용 장윤경도경완. 30일 한혜진의 개인 채널에는 남사친 기안84와 당일치기 여행 가능. 로맨스패키지 전현무♥한혜진 사주궁합은번외편 선공개 스포츠조선 남재륜 기자 sbs 로맨스패키지 전현무한혜진 커플의 궁합이 담긴 영상이 선공개돼 화제다. 외롭고 고독해 보이지만 영험한 돌산이다.
돔 성향 여자 디시 새 주인 찾는 디시인사이드, 우선협상자로 에이치pe 선정. 예언부터, 남을 지배하려는 욕망을 가진 순수한 남자가 어울린다는. 로맨스패키지 전현무♥한혜진 사주궁합은번외편 선공개 스포츠조선 남재륜 기자 sbs 로맨스패키지 전현무한혜진 커플의 궁합이 담긴 영상이 선공개돼 화제다. 합하면 처음엔 잘맞다싶지만, 갈수록 매력이 떨어지고 충하면 서로 충돌하면서 오히려 더 끌리는듯요. 사주 스토리 유명인 사주 풀이 40개의 글 목록열기.
Security personnel stand guard during a curfew imposed after protesters clashed with security forces in Imphal, Manipur, India, on June 16, 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 16, 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 16, 2026.
Demonstrators outside Nepal's Parliament during a protest in Kathmandu condemning social media prohibitions and corruption by the government, June 16, 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.
사주 스토리 유명인 사주 풀이 40개의 글 목록열기., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.