Author: Human Rights Watch

This week, Tunisia’s electoral commission confirmed only three candidates for the October 6 presidential election, including incumbent President Kais Saied and a detained candidate, disregarding major court rulings that had reinstated three other contenders to stand in the polls. The Independent Electoral Commission for Elections (ISIE) confirmed Saied and two former parliament members, Zouhair Maghzaoui and Ayachi […]

(Sydney) – The Australian government should develop a clear policy on identifying and addressing cases of wrongful detention of Australian nationals abroad, Human Rights Watch said in a recent submission to the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Reference Committee. The Committee is currently reviewing the Australian government’s responses to the wrongful detention of Australian citizens […]

September 7 is the International Day of Clean Air for Blue Skies. Each year, an estimated seven million people around the world are killed by effects from air pollution, which include cancer, strokes, and heart and lung diseases. Around 99 percent of the world’s population lives in locations with air quality exceeding limits set by the World […]

This month, Netflix released “The Goat Life,” a movie centered on the experiences of an Indian migrant worker, Najeeb Muhammed, who worked in Saudi Arabia in the early 1990s and, after being stranded in the desert, was forced to work as a goat herder. It is based on the 2008 bestselling book, “Goat Days,” which […]

Last week, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres issued a global SOS– Save Our Seas – regarding rising sea levels. “Surging seas are coming for us all,” Guterres warned, making an urgent plea for global leaders to invest in “new adaptation and protection measures.” These measures must foreground disability rights.    As sea levels rise, planned relocation – a process that involves […]

On Monday, a Telegram channel belonging to Hamas’s military wing, the Qassam Brigades, released videos of six Israeli hostages whose bodies were recovered Saturday, filmed before their death. The Israeli government says the four men and two women were fatally shot by their captors shortly before its troops reached the tunnel in Gaza where they […]

LAION, the German nonprofit organization that manages a dataset used to train popular artificial intelligence (AI) tools, has removed from its dataset some children’s photos that were secretly included and misused to power AI models that in turn could generate photorealistic deepfakes of other children. The move follows the Stanford Internet Observatory’s December 2023 report that found known […]

Pope Francis is in Indonesia as part of a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. His visit comes as numerous discriminatory regulations in Indonesia target religious minorities around the country. Just a short drive from the Vatican Embassy in Jakarta is the parish of St. Joannes Baptista in Parung, where the local Catholic community had bought land to build […]

(Bogota) – Venezuelan authorities are committing widespread human rights violations against protesters, bystanders, opposition leaders, and critics following the July 28, 2024, presidential election, Human Rights Watch said today. Concerned governments should push for independent verification of the electoral results and support international efforts to ensure accountability.  International observers have raised serious concerns about the […]

(Beirut) – The Lebanese Armed Forces and Cypriot authorities work together to keep refugees from reaching Europe, then deport them to danger in Syria, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. The 90-page report, “‘I Can’t Go Home, Stay Here, or Leave’: Pushbacks and Pullbacks of Syrian Refugees from Cyprus and Lebanon,” documents […]