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 12, 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 12, 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 12, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 12, 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 12, 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 12, 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 12, 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 12, 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 12, 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 12, 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 12, 2026.
91萝莉小奈 小欣奈 点击头像查看更多资源资源直达：st. Ririsuamano婉@daniellela58969 twitter profile. 对于二次元文化的爱好者而言，小欣奈的写真合集不仅是一种视觉享受，更是对二次元美学的一次次完美诠释。 她的作品既有二次元的梦幻感，又不失现实摄影的真实质感，这种独特的平衡使得她的作品在众多二次元博主中脱颖而出。. 对于二次元文化的爱好者而言，小欣奈的写真合集不仅是一种视觉享受，更是对二次元美学的一次次完美诠释。 她的作品既有二次元的梦幻感，又不失现实摄影的真实质感，这种独特的平衡使得她的作品在众多二次元博主中脱颖而出。.
小奈困鼠咯@xinnai_xabrine twitter profile.. Seen from japan theonlytribals profile image.. ✨穷光棍是做梦还是在幻想枣子姐cos 粉穴白虎骑乘高潮后入阿黑眼潮吹口爆白浆内射超多色情画面多个视角（完整版） 小.. 在当今二次元文化蓬勃发展的时代，小欣奈@lovewxnn以其独特的二次元萌妹风格在摄影圈崭露头角。 这位摄影师的作品集以4k超高清画质呈现，总容量高达416gb，内容丰富多样，且持续更新中，为二次元爱好者提供了宝贵的视觉盛宴。..
糖心成人网@indothaispecial twitter profile.. 把jk妹摁在落地窗前操楼下都是路过的行人抬头就能看到刺激的水更多了操到高潮就浑身颤抖年纪小小就那么骚，还有个亲妹妹正在开发一起双飞所有完整版皆在电报✈️群 read more.. 我网恋秀牛被录屏啊@liu13087890204 twitter profile.. 大家好，我是小欣奈@lovewxnn，一个热爱二次元文化的摄影师和模特。 今天想和大家分享我的写真作品合集，里面收录了我精心创作的4k高清萌系风格照片，总容量已经达到了428gb，并且还在不断更新中。..
Com › lovewxnn@lovewxnn x, 糖心vlog小欣奈 4k写真资源合集 47套 415gb 糖心小欣奈以其4k高清作品合集在cosplay界脱颖而出，她的作品以大胆和剧情化著称。 作为一个充满萌态的年轻女生，她热衷于扮演各种来自动漫或游戏的角色，如《原神》和《埃罗芒阿老师》等。. Xinnai_xabrine retweeted, ✨穷光棍是做梦还是在幻想枣子姐cos 粉穴白虎骑乘高潮后入阿黑眼潮吹口爆白浆内射超多色情画面多个视角（完整版） 小欣奈, 小奈困鼠咯@xinnai_xabrine twitter profile.
639 followers, 37 following, 小欣奈 verified account @lovewxnn. Alinaqv81961663s tweet video, 小欣奈🌸 @nainaiuvu twitter profile, 91萝莉小奈 twitter hashtag.
I am a sex showman avn 2026 verified account, 唯一大号@lovewxnn所有完整版 ✈️tg电报预览群： joined february 2024, 对于二次元文化的爱好者而言，小欣奈的写真合集不仅是一种视觉享受，更是对二次元美学的一次次完美诠释。 她的作品既有二次元的梦幻感，又不失现实摄影的真实质感，这种独特的平衡使得她的作品在众多二次元博主中脱颖而出。, Dy：ccc1126xxx 想要评论区d我哦.
Com › xiaoxinnai小欣奈「被窝时差」写真爆火！穿小熊睡衣的赖床瞬间太解压（附花絮）. 小欣奈lovewxnn @iovewxnn twitter profile, 作品完整版指路 ： 07年 糖心原创博主 极品白皮小萝莉一枚 唯一电报： 常驻杭州接线下全国可✈ 关注一下奈奈私信号防失联私信这里：@ read more, 小欣奈lovewxnn 糖心vlog认证主播，作品第一时间会在twitter预告并在 糖心上映！更多视频请登陆 糖心vlog！ 糖心地址： 小号@lovewxnn_, 糖心vlog，众多知名创作者强势入驻：台北娜娜、桥本香菜、玩偶姐姐、情深叉喔、饼干姐姐、小欣奈等人气vlog主带来海量优质内容，等你来发现！糖心vlog 致力于打造安全、私密、.
Ririsuamano婉@daniellela58969 twitter profile. Com › tag › 小欣奈小欣奈 资源合集每日更新 森图映像, Xinnai_xabrine retweeted. Com › lovewxnn@lovewxnn x. 小欣奈@lovewxnn twitter profile. Pixiv pixivに登録すると、糖心小欣奈さんの作品に対しいいね！やコメントをつけたり、メッセージを送り交流することが.
@heeyome 糖心vlog @tx11_tv twitter profile. Seen from japan theonlytribals profile image. Pujynyxx công c tìm thiết yếu của telegram giúp bạn dễ. 小欣奈lovewxnn @lovewxnn_ twitter profile. 639 followers, 37 following. agf 디시
@7e1lcdow5f5j0s3 穷光棍是做梦还是在幻想枣子姐cos 粉穴白虎骑乘高潮后入阿黑眼潮吹口爆白浆内射超多色情画面多个视角（完整版） 小欣奈の电报群：st. 唯一大号@lovewxnn所有完整版 ✈️tg电报预览群： joined february 2024. 糖心小欣奈个人简介 糖心小欣奈，也被粉丝亲切称为小欣奈或小欣，糖心小欣奈是糖心vlog旗下的一位以萝莉风格和cosplay为特色的演员，属于糖心八大家之一，主要活跃于国内各大城市，目前粉丝量达47万，其作品以精品著称。. Ririsuamano婉@daniellela58969 twitter profile. 糖心成人网@indothaispecial twitter profile. 65g 서안
65g컵 영상 Pujynyxx công c tìm thiết yếu của telegram giúp bạn dễ. 小欣奈lovewxnn 糖心vlog认证主播，作品第一时间会在twitter预告并在 糖心上映！更多视频请登陆 糖心vlog！ 糖心地址： 小号@lovewxnn_. Com › xiaoxinnai小欣奈「被窝时差」写真爆火！穿小熊睡衣的赖床瞬间太解压（附花絮）. Alicakes @aliiicakes twitter profile. 众多知名创作者强势入驻：台北娜娜、桥本香菜、玩偶姐姐、情深叉喔、饼干姐姐、小欣奈等人气vlog主带来海量优质内容，等你来发现！ 致力于打造安全、私密、便捷的使用. 99밤 업데이트 시간
@chisaiosiri 穷光棍是做梦还是在幻想枣子姐cos 粉穴白虎骑乘高潮后入阿黑眼潮吹口爆白浆内射超多色情画面多个视角（完整版） 小欣奈の电报群：st. 糖心小欣奈@tappendorf5441 twitter profile. Com › xiaoxinnai小欣奈「被窝时差」写真爆火！穿小熊睡衣的赖床瞬间太解压（附花絮）. Alicakes @aliiicakes twitter profile. Joined december 2023.
65g 디시 糖心vlog小欣奈 4k写真资源合集 47套 415gb 糖心小欣奈以其4k高清作品合集在cosplay界脱颖而出，她的作品以大胆和剧情化著称。 作为一个充满萌态的年轻女生，她热衷于扮演各种来自动漫或游戏的角色，如《原神》和《埃罗芒阿老师》等。. 小欣奈lovewxnn @iovewxnn twitter profile. ✨穷光棍是做梦还是在幻想枣子姐cos 粉穴白虎骑乘高潮后入阿黑眼潮吹口爆白浆内射超多色情画面多个视角（完整版） 小欣奈. 91萝莉小奈 twitter hashtag. Alicakes @aliiicakes twitter profile.
Security personnel stand guard during a curfew imposed after protesters clashed with security forces in Imphal, Manipur, India, on June 12, 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 12, 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 12, 2026.
Demonstrators outside Nepal's Parliament during a protest in Kathmandu condemning social media prohibitions and corruption by the government, June 12, 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.
, Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.
