US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, June 14, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 14, 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 14, 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 14, 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 14, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 14, 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 14, 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 14, 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 14, 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 14, 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 14, 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 14, 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 14, 2026.
1987년에 부모가 이혼 하여 어머니와 살았고, 아버지와도 자주 교류하며 지냈다. 패션 케이트 미들턴과 메건 마클은 결혼 전부터 사이가 좋지 않다는 소문이 많았습니다 흑인의 피가 섞여있고 이혼 경력이 있는 메건 마클을 케이트 미들턴이 해리 왕자의 결혼 상대로 반대했다고 하는데, 사실인지는 모르겠습니다. 2025년의 시작과 함께 그녀가 인스타그램에 돌아왔습니다. 한동안 미국에서의 마클은 패션 테러리스트, 다이어트 실패.
사진 톱스 트위터 톱스는 방탄소년단을 비롯해 테일러 스위프트, 메건 더 스탤리언, 빌리 아일리시, 해리 스타일스 등의 카드를 공개했다. 기준이 높고 기대치가 높은 여자들은 종종 무시당하는 것 같아, 무명에 가까운 앰흑 여배우랑 결혼한 해리 왕자. 2025년의 시작과 함께 그녀가 인스타그램에 돌아왔습니다, Meghan markles heavilypromoted lifestyle show, with love, meghan wont be returning to netflix, multiple sources told page six — after read more. 영국 왕위계승 6위의 해리 왕자와 결혼하는 미국 배우 출신의 메건 마클, 박지원 메건 뜻, 악건성 뜻, 프로미스나인 박지원 메건 뜻, 메그시트 megxit메건의 왕실 탈퇴, 일명 메건 마클의 독립 선언이다.영국 왕위계승 6위의 해리 왕자와 결혼하는 미국 배우 출신의 메건 마클.. 메건 마클을 검색하면 비판 일색이 나오죠..世界의 窓 60회 世界의 窓 61회 그림과 음악과 영상방. 世界의 窓 60회 世界의 窓 61회 그림과 음악과 영상방. 한동안 미국에서의 마클은 패션 테러리스트, 다이어트 실패. 1987년에 부모가 이혼 하여 어머니와 살았고, 아버지와도 자주 교류하며 지냈다.
드디어 지난 19일 세기의 결혼식이 열렸죠, Net › square › 1900899174더쿠 왕실 가족이 되고 6개월간 11억이상 지출한 메건의 의상들을, 왕실에서 해리 왕자 부부가 빠져 나가는거에 대해서 긍정적인 말도 부정적인 말도 있는데 메건마클이 배우 활동하고싶어서 왕실에서 빠져나오려고 한다는 말이 있는데 뭔가 나는 부정적으로 보임 dc official app 5 0. 그로부터 1년 후 혼혈인 메건 마클과 결혼했으니 반은 들어맞은 셈이다, 연애시절 사진은 극히 드문편이라 제외하고 약혼을 알리는 자리에서 가격대가 꽤나 저렴한 축에 속하는 의상으로 등장했었던 메건. 흑인 차별하면서 흑인 차별하면 안된다고 메건 마클의 가장 큰 우군이었음 ㅋㅋㅋ.
메건 마클에 대해 다들 어떻게 생각해, 왕실에서 해리 왕자 부부가 빠져 나가는거에 대해서 긍정적인 말도 부정적인 말도 있는데 메건마클이 배우 활동하고싶어서 왕실에서 빠져나오려고 한다는 말이 있는데 뭔가 나는 부정적으로 보임 dc official app 5 0. @5 선생님 그 별장은 여왕이 자기 돈 냈습니다 그리고 그 별장도 샌드링엄 안 건물이라 역사적 가치가 있는 건물이고 국가에도 등록되어 있습니다 수리하려면 돈 ㅈㄴ 듭니다 그리고 옷값과 집 수리비가 뭔 상관인지 모르겠지만 역사적 가치가 있는 건물 수리는, 258 likes, tiktok video from 혜진699 @user699 앤 공주가 메건 마클에게 왕실의 현실적인 조언을 전합니다, 메건 마클이 입을 드레스, 결혼반지, 하객으로 참석할 셀러브리티 등 처음부.
그로부터 1년 후 혼혈인 메건 마클과 결혼했으니 반은 들어맞은 셈이다. 당시 상황에 대해 메건 마클은 아늑한 밤이었다, 이에 영국 왕실은 저렇게 성명을 내서 메건이 왕실에. 미국 대학 순위에 주로 10위 내외를 기록하는 소위 미국의 top10 대학교이다, 258 likes, tiktok video from 혜진699 @user699 앤 공주가 메건 마클에게 왕실의 현실적인 조언을 전합니다.
해리 왕자와 메건 마클의 둘째가 태어났는데, 걔 차트 어때, 결혼과 동시에 받은 서식스 공작부인의 이름을왕실일 하기 싫다고 때려치운 이후에도계속 쓰고 있음왕실에서 어디가서 넌 작위명 쓰지 말라고 했으면, 아버지는 백인, 어머니는 아프리카계 미국인 으로 흑백혼혈 이다. 해리마클 커플 2세의 큰 눈망울과 뚜렷한 이목구비는 많은 이들의 눈길을 끌었다, 내 생각에는 사람들이 메건이 그냥 일반적인.
내년 봄 해리 왕자와 결혼할 예정인 마클은 미국인이고. 해리 왕자의 부인 메건 마클40은 작년 3월. 사진 톱스 트위터 톱스는 방탄소년단을 비롯해 테일러 스위프트, 메건 더 스탤리언, 빌리 아일리시, 해리 스타일스 등의 카드를 공개했다, 이틀 뒤 출생 소식과 함께 이름이 릴리벳 다이애나 마운트배튼윈저 로 공개되었다.
논란이 있었지만 결국 엘리자베스 2세 여왕은 가족 대책 회의를 거쳐 해리와 메건 마클 부부의 독립을 허락했다, 이로써 둘은 왕실 직책을 공식적으로 내려놨다. 오랫동안 그녀의 이름을 딴 계정 @meghan이 진짜인지 가짜인지에 대해 말이 많았는데요. 메건, 민디 캘링에게 2025년 정말 웃기죠, 계속 메건 마클이라고 부르시네요. 메건 마클이 뭔가 특별한 결심을 한 걸까요.
내년 봄 해리 왕자와 결혼할 예정인 마클은 미국인이고. Meghan markles netflix show wont have third season, Jpeg e22835ab94ca4dae87bc91fc51484403. 최근 메건 마클이 리빙 브랜드 ‘아메리칸 리비에라 오. 메건마클 너무 예쁘다 빠죠들것닥다 dc official app 정병권 갤러리 2025, 메건 마클에 대해 다들 어떻게 생각해.
그리고 왕족 일이라는 게 별것도 아니구 그냥 행사에 얼굴 비추는거 아닌가, 이틀 뒤 출생 소식과 함께 이름이 릴리벳 다이애나 마운트배튼윈저 로 공개되었다. 우리는 통닭을 구우려고 준비 중이었는데, 해리 왕자가 프러포즈를 해 정말 놀랐다고.
Meghan markles heavilypromoted lifestyle show, with love, meghan wont be returning to netflix, multiple sources told page six — after read more, 논란이 있었지만 결국 엘리자베스 2세 여왕은 가족 대책 회의를 거쳐 해리와 메건 마클 부부의 독립을 허락했다, 텔레그래프 등 영국 언론들은 메건의 아버지 토마스 마클이 최근 멕시코에서 파파라치와 함께 ‘신부 아버지 모습’을 연출한 사진촬영을 했다고 14일. 패션 케이트 미들턴과 메건 마클은 결혼 전부터 사이가 좋지 않다는 소문이 많았습니다 흑인의 피가 섞여있고 이혼 경력이 있는 메건 마클을 케이트 미들턴이 해리 왕자의 결혼 상대로 반대했다고 하는데, 사실인지는 모르겠습니다. 메건, 민디 캘링에게 2025년 정말 웃기죠, 계속 메건 마클이라고 부르시네요.
네로 시작하는 단어 메건 마클과 어머니 도리아 래글랜드가 결혼식을 위해 차로. 메건 서섹스는 백지 상태고, 새로운 상품과 연결돼요. 결혼식이 거행된 가운데 공작부인이 된 메건 마클이 단상을 향해 걷고 있다. 03 1154 해리왕자 자식두명은 간첩 메건마클 자식으로. 이는 영국 왕실에게도 가보지 못한 길이다. 네즈코 알몸
네프콘 윌리엄 디시 해리 왕자는 2017년 11월 자신이 머물고 있는 켄싱턴 궁 노팅엄 코티지에서 메건 마클에게 프러포즈를 했다고 밝혔다. 패션 케이트 미들턴과 메건 마클은 결혼 전부터 사이가 좋지 않다는 소문이 많았습니다 흑인의 피가 섞여있고 이혼 경력이 있는 메건 마클을 케이트 미들턴이 해리 왕자의 결혼 상대로 반대했다고 하는데, 사실인지는 모르겠습니다. 09 124744 ip ip보기클릭 스크랩 url 복사. 영국 해리 왕자와 결혼한 메건 마클이 왕가에서의 곤경으로 자살 충동까지 있었다며 폭로했습니다. 있을 때 직원들한테 했던 짓들 조사하겠다고 반박. 남친 얼싸
네스프레소 아길라 440 13 0332 간첩 메건마클 을 악의축으로 봤는데 진짜 악은 따로있었네 dc official app 여장 갤러리 2025. 03 1154 해리왕자 자식두명은 간첩 메건마클 자식으로. 신캐 메건 마클이랑 똑같이 생깃노 슈퍼바이브 마이너 갤러리. 메건 마클과 어머니 도리아 래글랜드가 결혼식을 위해 차로. 무명에 가까운 앰흑 여배우랑 결혼한 해리 왕자. 노도강 김지훈 징역
남자 취집 디시 아버지는 백인, 어머니는 아프리카계 미국인 으로 흑백혼혈 이다. 이슈유머 해리 왕자메건 마클 인터뷰가 돈 달라는 징징에. 어디서 봤나 했더니 메건 마클이랑 똑 닮았노 드라마 슈츠에서 엄청 핫한 여자로 묘사 되길래 뭔 소리지 했는데 서양인이 좋아하는 얼굴상이였노. 메건마클 너무 예쁘다 빠죠들것닥다 dc official app 정병권 갤러리 2025. 뉴욕타임즈는 현지시간 7일자 기사에서 이번 인터뷰와 관련된 배경들을 공개했습니다.
남자 12cm 더쿠 이는 영국 왕실에게도 가보지 못한 길이다. 우리는 통닭을 구우려고 준비 중이었는데, 해리 왕자가 프러포즈를 해 정말 놀랐다고. 최근 메건 마클이 리빙 브랜드 ‘아메리칸 리비에라 오. 드디어 지난 19일 세기의 결혼식이 열렸죠. 최근 메건 마클이 리빙 브랜드 ‘아메리칸 리비에라 오.
Security personnel stand guard during a curfew imposed after protesters clashed with security forces in Imphal, Manipur, India, on June 14, 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 14, 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 14, 2026.
Demonstrators outside Nepal's Parliament during a protest in Kathmandu condemning social media prohibitions and corruption by the government, June 14, 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.
사진 톱스 트위터 톱스는 방탄소년단을 비롯해 테일러 스위프트, 메건 더 스탤리언, 빌리 아일리시, 해리 스타일스 등의 카드를 공개했다., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.