Author: Human Rights Watch

A. Kayum Ahmed Since the US seized control of Guam during World War II, its military has turned the Pacific island into a fortress, destroying cultural sites, food sources, and limestone forests that contain medicinal plants used by the Indigenous Chamorro people. But on October 14, a Chamorro-led advocacy group, Prutehi Litekyan: Save Ritidian (Prutehi), […]

(Bangkok) – Successive Thai governments have failed to bring to justice former officials charged with murder and other offenses in connection with the deaths of 85 people, as well as injuries to hundreds following the violent dispersal of ethnic Malay Muslim protesters in Tak Bai district of Narathiwat province two decades ago, Human Rights Watch said […]

Joe Stork, a beloved mentor and friend to human rights activists across the Middle East and a treasured colleague whose career at Human Rights Watch spanned more than three decades, died unexpectedly on October 23, 2024, at his home in Washington, DC. He was 81. Stork, who joined Human Rights Watch in 1996 as the […]

(Beirut, October 26, 2024) – Israel’s renewed northern Gaza offensive is displacing and endangering hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, Human Rights Watch said today. Videos, photographs, satellite imagery, media reports, and UN agency reports analyzed by Human Rights Watch show that civilians are at grave risk of mass forced displacement and other atrocities as the last […]

Iran’s judiciary has announced the enforcement of a five-year prison sentence for two journalists accused of “propaganda against the state” over their reporting on the death in custody of Mahsa Jina Amini which sparked nationwide protests in 2022. Elaheh Mohammadi and Niloofar Hamedi, journalists from the “Ham-Mihan” and “Shargh” newspapers were among the first to report […]

Mozambique’s election commission today declared Daniel Chapo and his ruling party Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (Frente de Libertação de Moçambique, Frelimo) winners of the country’s October 9 general elections. The elections were marred by political killings, widespread irregularities, and restrictions on freedom of expression and assembly. International observers, including the African Union, European Union, and the Commonwealth, have raised serious […]

United Nations and African Union member states should begin planning the deployment of a mission to protect civilians in Sudan, where millions of people are displaced and face famine after a year and a half of brutal armed conflict.  In a new report to the UN Security Council, UN Secretary-General António Guterres outlines steps member states should take to […]

(Sydney) – The Australian government should take the lead with other governments to continue to publicly criticize grave human rights abuses in China, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said today. An Australian-led joint statement at the United Nations General Assembly on October 22, 2024, expressed ongoing concerns about the Chinese government’s serious human rights […]

On October 10, the Tangiers Court of Cassation overturned the 2019 conviction of a man for raping his wife, which had been hailed as Morocco’s first ruling to explicitly criminalize marital rape. By referring the case back to the Tangiers Appeals Court, which had sentenced the man to two years imprisonment and ordered him to pay a […]

Frontex, the EU border agency, does not normally inform nongovernmental rescue ships in the Mediterranean when it spots boats in distress or regularly issue emergency alerts. This has contributed to avoidable delays and tragic shipwrecks as well as to people being forcibly returned to countries where they face abuse. A new campaign asks Frontex to […]