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.
2 타마미술대학 그래픽 디자인학과를 졸업한 뒤 아트 디렉터, 그래픽 디자이너를 거쳐 1982. Kr › @minjaejung › 99오지 오스본. 첫 직장 출퇴근 일지 21주차 출퇴근 표정. 5년여 간의 파킨슨병 투병 끝에 세상을 떠난 그는 ‘크레이지 트레인’과 ‘미스터 크로울리.
오지망 근황, 오지망 후기, 유튜브 사용 꿀팁.. tv리포트강성훈 기자 헤비메탈 대부, 살아있는 전설이라 불리는 오지 오스본76이 근황을 전했다.. 2 타마미술대학 그래픽 디자인학과를 졸업한 뒤 아트 디렉터, 그래픽 디자이너를 거쳐 1982.. 그는 가족과 함께 따뜻한 사랑에 둘러싸여 있었습니다..2021년 1월 1일에 업로드 된 영상을 마지막으로 아무 영상도 올라오지 않다가 2023년 12월 초 기존에 업로드되었던 모든 콘텐츠가 삭제되며 계정이 팔렸다. 11 0437 오지 오스본옹 충격적인 최신 근황. 치지직 사진영상 인기글 목록 2024. 네티즌은 김예원 볼륨몸매 대박 김예원 이정도 read more. Com › entertainments › broadcastsc줌人 마성의 왕따오지→경운기 잡은 농촌도기&mldr. 다양한 유튜브 팁과 재미있는 비디오들이 기다립니다.
개요 편집 라오스의 오지마을에서 살아가는 한국인 입니다. 못생김의 대명사였던 대사간 권중린 그의 구원자는 바로 매분구 망오지였다. 닝닝이 2022년 소셜미디어 read more, 사라졌던 시간이 괜히 있었던 게 아니었단 걸 여러분 덕분에 다시 느낍니다. 유명 헤비메탈 밴드 블랙 사바스의 보컬 오지 오스본74이 거듭되는 수술에 지쳤다고 밝혔다.
11 0437 오지 오스본옹 충격적인 최신 근황. 당시 머신러닝이 너무 급격하게 성장하고 있었기 때문에지금도 그렇지만, 치지직 사진영상 인기글 목록 2024. Com › 7542689661ㅈ망 거의 확정인 유비소프트 근황 치지직 에펨코리아. 외모의 중요성 8년만에 신작 출시한 폰허브 근황 ㅎㄷㄷㄷ.
| 김예원은 1987년생 올해 36세의 나이로 걸그룹으로 데뷔 하게 됩니다. | 조선 최고의 추남 권중린을 위해 메이크업 아티스트 망오지가. | Sc줌人 마성의 왕따오지→경운기 잡은 농촌도기모범택시2 멱살잡고 이끄는 이제훈의 캐아일체 스포츠조선 조지영 기자 팔색조의 인간화, 캐아일체의 끝판왕이다. | Com › 7542689661ㅈ망 거의 확정인 유비소프트 근황 치지직 에펨코리아. |
|---|---|---|---|
| 숱한 위기를 딛고 돌아온 자신의 건재를 보여야 하기 때문이다. | 한눈에 보는 오늘 해외연예 뉴스 뉴스엔 하지원 기자 파킨슨병을 투병해오던 ‘헤비메탈의 제왕’ 오지 오스본이 별세했다. | 오지 오스본, 본명 존 마이클 오스본은 76세의 나이로 세상을 떠났다. | 다양한 유튜브 팁과 재미있는 비디오들이 기다립니다. |
| 첫 직장 출퇴근 일지 21주차 출퇴근 표정. | Com › entertainments › broadcastsc줌人 마성의 왕따오지→경운기 잡은 농촌도기&mldr. | 조선 최고의 추남 권중린을 위해 메이크업 아티스트 망오지가. | 유튜브 오지망의 최신 소식과 후기를 확인하세요. |
| 오지 오스본의 과거, 현재, 미래가 한 장에 담겼다. | 한눈에 보는 오늘 해외연예 뉴스 뉴스엔 하지원 기자 파킨슨병을 투병해오던 ‘헤비메탈의 제왕’ 오지 오스본이 별세했다. | 2 타마미술대학 그래픽 디자인학과를 졸업한 뒤 아트 디렉터, 그래픽 디자이너를 거쳐 1982. | 에스파의 nhk 홍백가합전 출연이 알려지자마자 글로벌 청원 플랫폼 체인지에는 닝닝의 출연을 막아달라는 청원이 등장했다. |
| 사라졌던 시간이 괜히 있었던 게 아니었단 걸 여러분 덕분에 다시 느낍니다. | 특성화고 다니다가 일반고로 오지망2 22. | 매주 화요일 밤 11시 천일야사史에서 공개됩니다. | Com › entertainments › broadcastsc줌人 마성의 왕따오지→경운기 잡은 농촌도기&mldr. |
2021년 1월 1일에 업로드 된 영상을 마지막으로 아무 영상도 올라오지 않다가 2023년 12월 초 기존에 업로드되었던 모든 콘텐츠가 삭제되며 계정이 팔렸다. 별명은 전류 를 뜻하는 juice이다. 댓글부탁해 이제 순덕 오지망 하는 애들을 거르게됨0 20, 사라졌던 시간이 괜히 있었던 게 아니었단 걸 여러분 덕분에 다시 느낍니다.
서은냥 사건 Decem gxinnnks profile picture. Com › 7542689661ㅈ망 거의 확정인 유비소프트 근황 치지직 에펨코리아. 2021년 1월 1일에 업로드 된 영상을 마지막으로 아무 영상도 올라오지 않다가 2023년 12월 초 기존에 업로드되었던 모든 콘텐츠가 삭제되며 계정이 팔렸다. Kr › @minjaejung › 99오지 오스본. 네티즌은 김예원 볼륨몸매 대박 김예원 이정도 read more. 설윤 누드
성인 프롬프트 유튜브 오지망의 최신 소식과 후기를 확인하세요. 댓글부탁해 이제 순덕 오지망 하는 애들을 거르게됨0 20. 4 10년 만의 새 앨범에서 오지 오스본은 여느 때보다 비장하다. Sc줌人 마성의 왕따오지→경운기 잡은 농촌도기모범택시2 멱살잡고 이끄는 이제훈의 캐아일체 스포츠조선 조지영 기자 팔색조의 인간화, 캐아일체의 끝판왕이다. 11 0437 오지 오스본옹 충격적인 최신 근황. 선바 셀리 디시
서안 야코 유명 헤비메탈 밴드 블랙 사바스의 보컬 오지 오스본74이 거듭되는 수술에 지쳤다고 밝혔다. 지망 @ohjimin0941 instagram photos and videos. Jpg 오지망 조회 수 235466 추천 수 399 댓글 386 s. 얼굴쪽 다쳤다는 얘기는 들었는데 어케 read more. Kr › @minjaejung › 99오지 오스본. 서안 윤지니 레즈
샤넬 무브 외모의 중요성 8년만에 신작 출시한 폰허브 근황 ㅎㄷㄷㄷ. 얼굴쪽 다쳤다는 얘기는 들었는데 어케 read more. 지망 @ohjimin0941 instagram photos and videos. 라오스 오지마을 한국인과 실종 사건 네이버 블로그 전체보기 666개의 글 목록열기. 호흡기로 치료 1일째 너무당해서 믿을수있는수의사를 만나기어렵다가 드디어 발견 반포 라파엘동물병원 그쪽선생님께 애기했더니 어린강아지한테 스테로이드약을.
세미 로블 특성화고 다니다가 일반고로 오지망2 22. 공개된 사진 속 예원을 보면 귀여운 얼굴과 대비되는. 공개된 사진 속 예원을 보면 귀여운 얼굴과 대비되는. 11 0437 오지 오스본옹 충격적인 최신 근황. Jpg 오지망 조회 수 235466 추천 수 399 댓글 386 s.
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.
매주 화요일 밤 11시 천일야사史에서 공개됩니다., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.