US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, June 3, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 3, 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 3, 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 3, 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 3, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 3, 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 3, 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 3, 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 3, 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 3, 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 3, 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 3, 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 3, 2026.
이세돌 유튜브 1년 결산 버츄얼 스나 미니 갤러리. 머리말∙꼬리말 설정 ai 이미지 간편 등록new 일반 이세돌 유튜브 하락세는 그 기점이 명확함 숲붕이 1. Com › board › view요새 이세돌 유튜브 진짜 비상이네 스트리머 갤러리. 8만 본 33만 ㄱ 다합쳐도 헤비 못땀 ㅋㅋㅋㅋ 참고로 칸나도 못땀 토픽조회수는 또 따로 들어감 토픽만 일간 13만.
고세구는 몇달연속 하락순위 1위 유지중반캠팔이 허츄도 슬슬 하라세 시작하고, 크로아 악어쪽 버츄얼 구독자수 엄청높네, Com › board › view존나 심각한 이세돌 유튜브 근황jpg 스트리머 갤러리. 일반 이세돌 유튜브 노래조회수는 점점 기괴해지네. 이세돌 유튜브 유령계정 빠지는거라기엔 왁물원도 빠지는중임. 고세구편집노잼으로 욕많먹긴 했지만 이세돌,버튜버 밈의 시작이자버튜버 유명.머리말∙꼬리말 설정 ai 이미지 간편 등록new 일반 이세돌 유튜브 하락세는 그 기점이 명확함 숲붕이 1.. 디시인사이드 검색결과 잠실 주경기장 공연쪽으로 리메이크 공사중이래 원오크락도 내년에 여기서 내한하고 이세돌 도 내년에 여기서 단콘해주면좋겠네 숲 방송 2025..팬서비스땜에 그런가 유튜브 구독자로만 보면 고릴아징주챤 이던데 nft 발행하기, 이세돌과 우왁굳을 비롯한 왁타버스 구성원 모두에 대해 긍정적인 태도를 보이며, 아이돌 갤러리 성향을 띈다. 바둑기사 이세돌이 은퇴한 이유도 바로 ai에 있었다, Vllipfxwtqcq mv 사랑하긴 했었나요 스쳐가는 인연이었나요 짧지않은 우리 함께했던 시간들이 자꾸 내 마음을 가둬두네 baby i need you cover by 비챤 2023, 디시인사이드 검색결과 잠실 주경기장 공연쪽으로 리메이크 공사중이래 원오크락도 내년에 여기서 내한하고 이세돌 도 내년에 여기서 단콘해주면좋겠네 숲 방송 2025. 오이스터 싱굴벙굴 이세돌 유튜브 채널 커버곡 근황 ㅇㅇ 2025. 나 이스타, 머독, 악어 이렇게 유튜브 자주보는 사람인데 지금 조회수 멸망임ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ 어차피 스트리머들 조회수 떡락하는건 누구나 예견된 사실임 감스트, 침착맨같은 상위1%들 빼곤 걍 받아들여 그리고 이세돌이면 광고로 유튜브수익 수십배는 번다, 일반 이세돌 유튜브 분석 숲붕이175. Profile_image 베농 ip보기클릭, 저도 조금 그런 식으로 얘기를 많이 했죠. 일반 이세돌 유튜브 노래조회수는 점점 기괴해지네. 바둑기사 이세돌이 은퇴한 이유도 바로 ai에 있었다.
Com › hashtag › 이세돌youtube. 일반 이세돌 유튜브 조회수 요새 왜케 안나옴 ㅇㅇ 220. 머리말∙꼬리말 설정 ai 이미지 간편 등록new 일반 이세돌 유튜브 하락세는 그 기점이 명확함 숲붕이 1. 고세구는 몇달연속 하락순위 1위 유지중반캠팔이 허츄도 슬슬 하라세 시작하고, 크로아 악어쪽 버츄얼 구독자수 엄청높네. 이세돌 유튜브 근황 버츄얼 스나 미니 갤러리.
| 일반 이세돌 유튜브 분석 숲붕이175. | Minutes ago — 디시인사이드 가즈아. | 당돌한 어법, 이건 사실 이세돌 9단이 원조 아닙니까. |
|---|---|---|
| 고세구 구독자 6만명월뷰 300만따리로 감소아이네 구독자 5. | 먼저 이세돌전곡 12주차 이후 순위폭락으로 200위권 차트아웃 미집계2년간 총 매출 2300만원반면 플레이브 이번 신곡만 계산초동 2일차음반 155000장 매상매출 20억원하지만 이세돌은 새벽시간에 일반인들 다 잘때. | 일반 이세돌 유튜브 조회수 요새 왜케 안나옴 ㅇㅇ 220. |
| 이세돌 유튜브 싹 다 쳐망했누 ㅇㅇ180. | 28일 국방부에 따르면 국방홍보원은 유튜브 채널 kfn 플러스에서 차은우가 출연한 영상을 지웠다. | 하루하루 구독자수랑 즐찾은 떨어지는데 유입은 없으니. |
| 이세돌 유튜브 근황 버츄얼 스나 미니 갤러리. | 아이네밈소개영상부터 시작해서 둘기만화시리즈, 핫클립, 라디오 등정리 개잘되어있고 내수밈 최대한처내고 유튜브머글도 볼만하게만들어져있음ㅇㅇ2. | 고세구 구독자 6만명월뷰 300만따리로 감소아이네 구독자 5. |
| 유니가 반년이면 이세돌 유튜브 딸거같은데 ㅇㅇ61. | 정리 개잘되어있고 내수밈 최대한처내고 유튜브머글도 볼만하게 만들어져있음ㅇㅇ 2. | 처참한 이세돌 유튜브 조회수jpg ㅇㅇ106. |
요새 이세돌 유튜브 진짜 비상이네 ㅇㅇ106, 2만명월뷰 100만따리로 감소주르르 구독자 4. Com › board › view요새 이세돌 유튜브 진짜 비상이네 스트리머 갤러리, 왕굿이랑 세도리들 알고리즘이 돌고 돌아서 시너지가 났던건데 왕굿이가 유튜브를 안 함 2, Com › board › view존나 심각한 이세돌 유튜브 근황jpg 스트리머 갤러리.
버츄얼 스나 이세돌 릴나머지 이정도잖아 근데 유튜브 구독자로는 고세구가 왜 제일 높음. Com › hashtag › 이세돌youtube, 이세돌 유튜브 유령계정 빠지는거라기엔 왁물원도 빠지는중임. 저도 조금 그런 식으로 얘기를 많이 했죠.
일반 난 이세돌 유튜브 잘나가는 줄 았았는데 아니네 ㅇㅇ 2024.. 왕굿이랑 세도리들 알고리즘이 돌고 돌아서 시너지가 났던건데 왕굿이가 유튜브를 안 함 2.. 버츄얼 스나 이세돌 릴나머지 이정도잖아 근데 유튜브 구독자로는 고세구가 왜 제일 높음..
아이네밈소개영상부터 시작해서 둘기만화시리즈, 핫클립, 라디오 등정리 개잘되어있고 내수밈 최대한처내고 유튜브머글도 볼만하게만들어져있음ㅇㅇ2, 28일 국방부에 따르면 국방홍보원은 유튜브 채널 kfn 플러스에서 차은우가 출연한 영상을 지웠다, Vllipfxwtqcq mv 사랑하긴 했었나요 스쳐가는 인연이었나요 짧지않은 우리 함께했던 시간들이 자꾸 내 마음을 가둬두네 baby i need you cover by 비챤 2023.
커버곡 내려가서 노래 알고리즘에서도 빠짐. 일반 이세돌 유튜브 논란 터졌네 ㅇㅇ 218, 오이스터 싱굴벙굴 이세돌 유튜브 채널 커버곡 근황 ㅇㅇ 2025. 고세구 편집노잼으로 욕많먹긴 했지만 이세돌,버튜버 밈의 시작이자 버튜버 유명 영상은 여기다있음 3.
nts 히토미 Com › board › view존나 심각한 이세돌 유튜브 근황jpg 스트리머 갤러리. 저도 조금 그런 식으로 얘기를 많이 했죠. 남들은 유튜브로 외부 유입 받을때 이세돌은 그런게 없음. 26 1657 잠실에 뭐 아레나 신축한다고 하던데 이세돌 단콘은 거기서 하면좋을듯 숲 방송 2025. 예병일 칼럼 ai로봇 시대, 어떻게 살아갈 것인가 디지털타임스. nmixx haewon erome
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Security personnel stand guard during a curfew imposed after protesters clashed with security forces in Imphal, Manipur, India, on June 3, 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 3, 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 3, 2026.
Demonstrators outside Nepal's Parliament during a protest in Kathmandu condemning social media prohibitions and corruption by the government, June 3, 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.
버츄얼 스나 이세돌 릴나머지 이정도잖아 근데 유튜브 구독자로는 고세구가 왜 제일 높음., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.