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.
Com › talk › 375200223제니 아줌마 까댓은 어캐 1분삭제 되는거임. 그룹 방탄소년단bts 멤버 뷔와 블랙핑크 제니로 추정되는 커플이 이마 키스를 하는 사진이 유출됐다. 제니뷔 사생활 사진 유출에yg 최초 유포자 수사의뢰. 뷔제니 사진 유출, 체포해봐라 여유만만 도발 스포츠경향.
해킹범, 리사가 사진을 제공해줬다 새로운 주장 by iworldt 2022. Kr › news › culture속옷 차림에 불꽃까지&mldr, 강경윤 기자의 연예뉴스 온라인상 사진 유출로 열애설에 휩싸인 뷔와 제니에 대한 뉴스를 전한다. 서울뉴시스전재경 기자 그룹 방탄소년단 멤버 뷔와 블랙핑크 제니로 추정되는 커플 사진이 또 유출됐다.연중 라이브 kbs 220825 방송. Com › talk › 375200223제니 아줌마 까댓은 어캐 1분삭제 되는거임. 그룹 방탄소년단 멤버 뷔 왼쪽, 블랙핑크 멤버 제니. 연중 라이브 kbs 220825 방송. 서울뉴시스전재경 기자 그룹 방탄소년단 멤버 뷔와 블랙핑크 제니로 추정되는 커플 사진이 또 유출됐다.
강경윤 기자의 연예뉴스 온라인상 사진 유출로 열애설에 휩싸인 뷔와 제니에 대한 뉴스를 전한다, 최근 제니의 사진을 잇달아 유출해온 트위터리안 a의 소행입니다. 서울뉴시스전재경 기자 그룹 방탄소년단 멤버 뷔와 블랙핑크 멤버 제니가 또 열애설에 휩싸였다.
그룹 블랙핑크 제니의 생일파티 현장을 담은 짧은 영상이 온라인에서 빠르게 확산되며 논란이 커지고 있다, 사진 속 주인공이 뷔와 제니가 맞다면 이는 사생활에 해당되는 개인 사진이 해킹당해 유출된 것일 가능성이 높다. 그런데도 소속사가 별다른 대응을 하지 않는 것으로 보이자 제니의 국내외 일부 팬들은 지난 23일 성명문을 배포해 yg엔터테인먼트의 대응을 촉구했다.
Com › talk › 375200223제니 아줌마 까댓은 어캐 1분삭제 되는거임. 서울뉴시스전재경 기자 그룹 방탄소년단 멤버 뷔와 블랙핑크 제니로 추정되는 커플 사진이 또 유출됐다, Com › talk › 375200273제니 몽클 쇼 간다는 소식에 역시나 발작하는 중ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ 네이트 판, 지난 6일과 7일현지시각 미국 로스앤젤레스 피콕 극장에서 제니는, Com › newsview › 26c7gpjnip전문 yg 제니 사생활 사진 유출공유는 불법&mldr.
Com › yunys4303 › 224151401092 30살 생일파티 유출 영상 논란&mldr.. Com › newsview › 20250310503346중요 부위가 ‘선정성 논란’ 터진 제니, 어떻길래.. 연중 라이브 kbs 220825 방송.. Com › newsview › 20250310503346중요 부위가 ‘선정성 논란’ 터진 제니, 어떻길래..
지난 6일과 7일현지시각 미국 로스앤젤레스 피콕 극장에서 제니는. 28일 채팅방을 개설하고 29일 뷔와 제니가 커플티를 입고 있는 사진을 유출했다, Spiderman22 read more, 스포츠서울 박진업 기자블랙핑크 제니 jennie의 파격 공연 의상이 충격을 넘어 논란을 낳고 있다.
특히 최초 유포자는 제니 측에 sns를 통해 자신에게 연락할 것을 요구하거나 추가 사진 공개를 예고하는 등 과감한 행보로 눈살을 찌푸리게 했습니다, 블랙핑크 제니왼쪽, 방탄소년단 뷔 ⓒ 뉴스1 db 보이그룹 방탄소년단bts 멤버 뷔와 걸그룹 블랙핑크 멤버 제니의 열애설로 가요계가 뜨겁다. 16일 온라인 커뮤니티에는 제니 뷔 또.
Com › newsview › 20250310503346중요 부위가 ‘선정성 논란’ 터진 제니, 어떻길래. 서울뉴시스전재경 기자 그룹 방탄소년단 멤버 뷔와 블랙핑크 제니로 추정되는 커플 사진이 또 유출됐다. 스포츠서울 박진업 기자블랙핑크 제니jennie의 파격 공연 의상이 충격을 넘어 논란을 낳고 있다.
‘흡연 연상’ 촛불 퍼포먼스 논란이 채 가라앉기도 전에, 이번엔 클럽 파티 영상이 유출되며 선정성과 안전불감증 논란에 휩싸였다. 블랙핑크의 소속사 yg엔터테인먼트는 블랙핑크 제니의 ‘개인 사진. 블랙핑크 제니가 메이크업을 받는 도중 실내에서 전자 담배를 피우는 영상이 유출되며 큰 논란을 일으키고 있다.
실제로 최근 해외 클럽에서 비슷한 형태의 폭죽 연출이 화재로 이어져 사상자가 발생한 사례가 거론되면서, 연예인 파티 문화가 안전 경각심 없이 소비되는 것 아니냐는 우려도 커지고 있다. Com › newsview › 26c7gpjnip전문 yg 제니 사생활 사진 유출공유는 불법&mldr, 속옷 차림에 불꽃까지제니, 생일파티 영상 유출에 시끌.
히토미al 제니는 해당 영상을 자신의 소셜 미디어에 게시한 후 즉시 삭제하고 소속사와 함께 공식 사과문을 발표했지만, 누리꾼들의 비난은 사그라들지 않고 있다. 특히 최초 유포자는 제니 측에 sns를 통해 자신에게 연락할 것을 요구하거나 추가 사진 공개를 예고하는 등 과감한 행보로 눈살을 찌푸리게 했습니다. 지난달 23일 트위터에서 한 트위터리안이 뷔와 제니로 추정되는 커플 사진을 유출하기 시작한 후 공식 석상이 아닌 사적 공간에 모습을 드러낸 건 이번이. 더불어 해킹범은 유출 방법으로 사용했던 트위터가 정지당하자 텔레그램으로 변경했으며, 지난 8월 28일 텔레그램에 채팅방을 개설하고, 이튿날인 8월 29일 세 번째 사진을 유출했습니다. 속옷 차림에 불꽃까지제니, 생일파티 영상 유출에 시끌. 히토미 최음제
히토미 슨도메 Com › newsview › 26c7gpjnip전문 yg 제니 사생활 사진 유출공유는 불법&mldr. 그 사진 중에는 제니가 반신욕하고 있는 사진도 담겨 있어 충격을 주었습니다. 지난 6일과 7일현지시각 미국 로스앤젤레스 피콕 극장에서 제니는. 블랙핑크 제니가 메이크업을 받는 도중 실내에서 전자 담배를 피우는 영상이 유출되며 큰 논란을 일으키고 있다. 뷔제니, 열애설 주장 또 나왔다유출된 사진 봤더니. 히토미 아카네
히토미 태그 삭제 더불어 해킹범은 유출 방법으로 사용했던 트위터가 정지당하자 텔레그램으로 변경했으며, 지난 8월 28일 텔레그램에 채팅방을 개설하고, 이튿날인 8월 29일 세 번째 사진을 유출했습니다. 제니뷔 사생활 사진 유출에yg 최초 유포자 수사의뢰. 주요부위 노출논란 제니 yg 잔인한 평가, 나로 살기 쉽지. 최근 제니의 사진을 잇달아 유출해온 트위터리안 a의 소행입니다. 그룹 방탄소년단 멤버 뷔 왼쪽, 블랙핑크 멤버 제니. 히토미 촉수물 추천
히토미라 한국어 16일 온라인 커뮤니티에는 제니 뷔 또. 그룹 블랙핑크 제니의 생일파티 현장을 담은 짧은 영상이 온라인에서 빠르게 확산되며 논란이 커지고 있다. Com › yunys4303 › 224151401092 30살 생일파티 유출 영상 논란&mldr. 방탄소년단bts 멤버 뷔와 블랙핑크 멤버 제니의 열애설이 재점화됐다. 블랙핑크의 소속사 yg엔터테인먼트는 블랙핑크 제니의 ‘개인 사진.
히토미 수수한 일본에서 열린 것으로 알려진 이번 파티 영상은 ‘선정성’ 논란뿐 아니라 ‘안전불감증’ 지적까지 나오면서 네티즌들 사이에서 찬반 논쟁이 이어지는 분위기다. 서울뉴시스전재경 기자 그룹 방탄소년단 멤버 뷔와 블랙핑크 멤버 제니가 또 열애설에 휩싸였다. 영상 뷔제니 세번째 사진 유출생각보다 심각한 해킹범죄. 이 사건은 kpop 무대 의상과 공연 문화에 대한 중요한 논의로 이어지고 있습니다. ‘흡연 연상’ 촛불 퍼포먼스 논란이 채 가라앉기도 전에, 이번엔 클럽 파티 영상이 유출되며 선정성과 안전불감증 논란에 휩싸였다.
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.
속옷 차림에 불꽃까지제니, 생일파티 영상 유출에 시끌., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.