Category: Human Rights

(Beirut) – Turkish airstrikes since November 20, 2022, are inflicting damage on densely populated areas and critical infrastructure across north and northeast Syria and exacerbating an already catastrophic humanitarian crisis for Kurds, Arabs, and other communities in the region, Human Rights Watch said today. The strikes have displaced families, caused significant power cuts and fuel […]

Recent communications from several United Nations experts to the Saudi government and Ansar Allah, also known as the Houthi forces, the de facto authority in much of Yemen, laid out a series of grave allegations of rights abuse against migrants and asylum seekers, including killings, torture, arbitrary detention, and sexual abuse. Unfortunately, both sides to […]

(Nairobi) – The Eritrean government should immediately release Ciham Ali Abdu, unlawfully held since she was arrested a decade ago, when she was only 15, Human Rights Watch said today. She is a dual United States-Eritrean national. Ciham was born in Los Angeles on April 3, 1997, but moved to Eritrea’s capital, Asmara, with her […]

  (Athens, December 8, 2022) – Greece’s lawmakers are considering a draft surveillance law that lacks effective privacy and human rights safeguards, Human Rights Watch said today. Surveillance legislation should not go forward without clear safeguards in place and until the completion of a thorough and independent investigation into a major surveillance scandal implicating the […]

(Tunis) – Tunisian authorities are failing to protect women from domestic violence despite enacting a strong law in 2017, Human Rights Watch said in a report published today. The 94-page report, “So What If He Hit You?: Addressing Domestic Violence in Tunisia,” found that despite the commitment of some officials and one of the strongest […]

(Brussels) – The decision on December 8, 2022, by the Council of the European Union to admit Croatia into the Schengen area despite substantiated reports of frequent breaches of EU and international human rights law by Croatian authorities and its border guards shows disregard for the EU’s commitment to fundamental rights, eight leading human rights […]

(Jakarta) – The Indonesian parliament passed a new criminal code on December 6, 2022, containing provisions that seriously violate international human rights law and standards, Human Rights Watch said today. Articles in the new code violate the rights of women, religious minorities, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people, and undermine rights to freedom […]

When I found Arita, she was standing at the entrance of a dark and musty room at Mt. Horeb Prayer Centre, in eastern Ghana. A heavy metal chain laid on the ground beside her. She had been shackled on and off during her four years at the center, she said. At the moment she could […]

On December 8, 2022, the US Congress passed the Respect for Marriage Act, which protects statutory recognition of interracial and same-sex marriages in the United States. US courts have long recognized a constitutional right to marry. In 1967, the US Supreme Court ruled in Loving v. Virginia that bans on interracial marriage were unconstitutional, extending […]

A new report, including disturbing video and audio evidence, shows security forces along European Union borders detaining migrants and asylum seekers at secret locations before forcing them back across borders. The report, released by collaborative journalism outfit Lighthouse Reports, primarily documented abuses occurring in Bulgaria, Hungary, and Croatia. Since 2014, Human Rights Watch and others […]