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.
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.
이날 모범택시 시즌3 에피소드는 무지개 다크히어로즈 내부에서 피해자. 11화는 사기 피해의 끝이 어디까지 이어질 수 있는지를 그려냅니다. 방송일정 11월 21일1월 10일, 출연진이제훈김의성표예진장혁진배유람, 특별출연, 일본 로케이션, 스토리까지 모두 담았어요. ♀️ 이번 주 모범택시3 전개 진짜 대박입니다.
| 이 드라마는 베일에 가려진 택시회사 무지개 운수와 택시기사 김도기가 피해자를 대신해 복수에 나서는 이야기를 그린 히어로물이에요. | 택시를 운행하던 도기 이제훈는 한강에 뛰어드는 아이돌 연습생, 로미 오가빈를 발견하고 구해낸다. | 그리고 돈을 잃은 순간보다, 그 이후에 무너지는 일상이 더 잔혹하다는 점을 담담하게 보여줍니다. | 模范出租车2 1062 2023 韩国 剧情情韩国 《模范出租车2》(朝鲜语:모범택시2/模範택시2,英语:taxi driver 2),为韩国sbs于2023年2月17日起播出的电视剧,改编自carlos创作的同名网络漫画,由《被操纵的都市》、《. |
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| 억울한 피해자들을 대신한 통쾌한 복수극으로 사랑받은 sbs 드라마 가 시즌 3으로 돌아왔다. | 模范出租车3 모범택시시즌32025暂无分. | 하지만 장갑이 아닌 벽돌을 받는 사기를 당한다. | Sbs 새 금토드라마 모범택시3극본 오상호연출. |
| Com › jakeunji333 › 224122892167모범택시3 11화 12화 중고거래 사기 모티브 빌런 고작가 김성규와. | 그리고 돈을 잃은 순간보다, 그 이후에 무너지는 일상이 더 잔혹하다는 점을 담담하게 보여줍니다. | 11화에서는 무지개 다크히어로즈가 악질 중고거래 사기 조직에 맞서 활약하는 이야기가 그려졌다. | 모범택시3 11월 돌아온다이제훈→김의성, 이번엔 국제 공조 osen최이정 기자 한국형 케이퍼 드라마의 획을 그은 sbs 새 금토드라마 모범택시3가 1차 티저를 공개해 더욱 스펙터클해진 세계관의 확장을 예고한다. |
| 이날 모범택시 시즌3 에피소드는 무지개 다크히어로즈 내부에서 피해자. | Com › jakeunji333 › 224122892167모범택시3 11화 12화 중고거래 사기 모티브 빌런 고작가 김성규와. | 억울한 피해자들을 대신한 통쾌한 복수극으로 사랑받은 sbs 드라마 가 시즌 3으로 돌아왔다. | 표예진, 이제훈과 함께 연탄가스 속 쓰러진 사람 구출. |
이제훈x표예진 ‘모범택시3’ 매 시즌 화제가 됐던 sbs 시리즈가 세 번째 이야기로 돌아옵니다. 模范出租车3 모범택시시즌3 2025 韩国更至11集 1080p 内. ♀️ 이번 주 모범택시3 전개 진짜 대박입니다.
Sbs promotional videolee je hoon sbs새금토. 이제훈이 핸들을 잡고 억울한 피해자의 정의를 되 read more. 이번 시즌 역시 이제훈이 주인공 김도기 역을 맡아 베일에 싸인 택시회사 무지개 운수와 함께 억울한 피해자들을.
♀️ 이번 주 모범택시3 전개 진짜 대박입니다.. 片名:模范出租车3 状态:更新至16集 主演:李帝勋表艺珍金义城张赫镇裴侑蓝笠松将 导演:姜宝承 年份:2025 地区:韩国 类型:剧情动作悬疑犯罪.. 2%로 15%를 돌파했으며, 전국 기준 14.. 11화는 사기 피해의 끝이 어디까지 이어질 수 있는지를 그려냅니다..
모범택시 시즌3 11화 중고사기 빌런 낚았다. 이날 모범택시 시즌3 에피소드는 무지개 다크히어로즈 내부에서 피해자. 그리고 돈을 잃은 순간보다, 그 이후에 무너지는 일상이 더 잔혹하다는 점을 담담하게 보여줍니다. Part 1original sound creative tv. ♀️ 이번 주 모범택시3 전개 진짜 대박입니다. 模范出租车3 모범택시시즌32025暂无分.
模范出租车2 1062 2023 韩国 剧情情韩国 《模范出租车2》(朝鲜语:모범택시2/模範택시2,英语:taxi driver 2),为韩国sbs于2023年2月17日起播出的电视剧,改编自carlos创作的同名网络漫画,由《被操纵的都市》、《, Sbs 새 금토드라마 모범택시3극본 오상호연출. 하지만 장갑이 아닌 벽돌을 받는 사기를 당한다.
프롤로그 스토리 디시 이제훈ㄷㄷ 여고생을 구하기 위해 일본을 재패하러 간 개미친. 모범택시 시즌3 11화 중고 사기꾼 빌런 bnt뉴스. 又名:모범택시3 模范计程车3台 taxi driver season 3. 어머니가 살해당하는 비극을 겪은 특수부대 요원 출신 김도기이제훈. 전설의 군인도기가 해결할 모범택시3 마지막 이야기✨ 모범택시3 sbs. 펨숲갤
팬더티비 서리나 이제훈이 핸들을 잡고 억울한 피해자의 정의를 되 read more. 모범택시 시즌3의 방송이 다가오는데 정확한 정보를 원하세요. 그리고 돈을 잃은 순간보다, 그 이후에 무너지는 일상이 더 잔혹하다는 점을 담담하게 보여줍니다. 模范出租车3 모범택시시즌32025暂无分. 이날 모범택시 시즌3 에피소드는 무지개 다크히어로즈 내부에서 피해자. 페리스코프 예진
패트리온 다운로더 디시 10회까지는 시청률이 답보 상태를 유지하면서 이전 시리즈 대비 시청률 추이가 약간 아쉬운 수준이었는데, 11회에서 금요일 방영분도 12%를 기록하고, 12회에서 수도권 기준 15. 사적 복수 대행 서비스 무지개 운수가 돌아왔다. 병원에 입원한 아빠를 위해 중고거래 어플에서 장갑을 산 다솜 차준희. 11화에서는 무지개 다크히어로즈가 악질 중고거래 사기 조직에 맞서 활약하는 이야기가 그려졌다. 이제훈x표예진 ‘모범택시3’ 매 시즌 화제가 됐던 sbs 시리즈가 세 번째 이야기로 돌아옵니다. 페깅 야짤
펑위 lpl 韩国日韩剧《模范出租车3》,又名:《모범택시3,模范计程车3 台,taxi driver season 3,模范出租车3 모범택시 시즌3》。剧情介绍:5283,开始行动!. 26일 방송된 sbs 모범택시 시즌3 11화에서는 중고사기 조직을 정조준했다. 하지만 장갑이 아닌 벽돌을 받는 사기를 당한다. 11화는 중고거래 사기라는 익숙한 범죄로 시작하지만, 이야기의 초점은 곧 사기 이후로 이동합니다. 방송일정 11월 21일1월 10일, 출연진이제훈김의성표예진장혁진배유람, 특별출연, 일본 로케이션, 스토리까지 모두 담았어요.
펨돔 볼버 모범택시 시즌3 ott 공개 이후 시청자들의 관심이 폭발적으로 몰리고 있습니다. 모범택시3 taxi driver3 금토드라마. Sbs promotional videolee je hoon sbs새금토. 이 드라마는 베일에 가려진 택시회사 무지개 운수와 택시기사 김도기가 피해자를 대신해 복수에 나서는 이야기를 그린 히어로물이에요. 又名:모범택시3 模范计程车3台 taxi driver season 3.
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.
모범택시 시즌3정의가 실종된 사회, 전화 한 통이면 오케이베일에 가려진 택시회사 무지개 운수와 택시기사 김도기가억울한 피해자를 대신해., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.