Click to expand Image Then-Brig. Gen. Peter Elwelu of Uganda Peoples’ Defence Forces gives an interview at Mbarara military base, Uganda, on February 7, 2014. © 2014 Isaac Kasmani/AFP via Getty Images On May 30, the US government announced travel sanctions against five former and current Ugandan government officials, including Peter Elwelu, the former deputy chief of the Ugandan Peoples’ Defence Forces (UPDF). The US State Department announced that Elwelu was sanctioned due to “extrajudicial killings that were committed by members of the UPDF” while he was commanding Ugandan military ..read more

Click to expand Image Advocates for the rights of older people -- Elisha, from Tanzania (left), and Amarsanaa, from Mongolia -- attend the Open Ended Working Group on Ageing in New York, December 2016. © 2016 Jemma Stovell/Help Age International In a historic decision last week, a longstanding United Nations body recognized that the international human rights system doesn’t fully protect older people’s rights, and it recommended a new human rights treaty to help correct this. Chaired by Argentina and following negotiations facilitated by Brazil and Portugal, the UN Open-ended Working Group on ..read more

Click to expand Image Indigenous groups protest deforestation of their ancestral rainforests in Miri, Sarawak, October 2020. © 2020 The Borneo Project (Brussels) – The European Commission should include independent civil society groups in ongoing key talks with Malaysia and Indonesia over its anti-deforestation rules, a delegation of Indigenous, human rights and environmental organizations said today. In June 2023, the two Southeast Asian countries formed a task force with the European Commission to resolve tensions over the implementation of a vital new European Union law to tackle globa ..read more

  (Bonn) – Governments attending UN climate talks in Bonn from June 3 to June 13, 2024 should push for rights-respecting and ambitious climate action, Human Rights Watch said today. The Bonn Climate Change conference will lay the groundwork for negotiations at the UN Conference of Parties (COP29) from November 11 to November 22, 2024. At the 28th United Nations Conference of Parties (COP28), governments agreed to transition away from fossil fuels. At the Bonn climate talks, they should follow through on this commitment by implementing a full phaseout of all fossil fuels in a just and ..read more

Click to expand Image On January 6, 2021, Hong Kong police arrested 53 pro-democracy politicians for “subversion” because they had organized or participated in an unofficial public opinion poll in July 2020 to coordinate pro-democracy candidates for the then-upcoming LegCo elections.  (c) 2021 Lam Chun-tung/Initium  (New York) – The Hong Kong government should immediately quash a court’s groundless national security law convictions of prominent pro-democracy activists, Human Rights Watch said today. On May 30, 2024, three judges handpicked by the Beijing-controlled Hong Kong chief executi ..read more

Click to expand Image Filipino Catholic priest Father Amado Picardal in Manila, Philippines, May 13, 2016. © 2016 Aaron Favila/AP Photo Fr. Amado Picardal, a Redemptorist priest who exposed killings by the so-called Davao Death Squad in the Philippines, died on Wednesday at age 69. Colleagues said Father Picx, as he was known, died from cardiac arrest in Cebu province, where he had been living a life of solitude and silence as a hermit. Picardal was one of the first to sound the alarm about extrajudicial killings in Davao City on the southern island of Mindanao in the late 1990s ..read more

Click to expand Image Kigali, Rwanda, September 5, 2019. © The Rwandan government’s decision to block Human Rights Watch senior researcher Clémentine de Montjoye from entering the country this month was not a complete surprise. Unfortunately, the vague and unfounded allegations against de Montjoye are part of a long-running pattern from a government intolerant of anyone reviewing its human rights record. In barring entry to de Montjoye, authorities accused her of “misrepresenting the purpose of her visit.” She had earlier written to the authorities to request meetings and inform ..read more

Click to expand Image Prime Minister of Poland Donald Tusk and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen during press conference after their meeting in Warsaw, Poland, February 23, 2024. © 2024 Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via AP Photo The European Commission decided to close the article 7 procedure against Poland on Wednesday, despite Poland’s newly elected government not having implemented all needed reforms. Article 7 is the EU’s primary treaty-based mechanism to hold accountable EU member states that undermine the bloc’s values, including by violating the rule of law. Article 7 ..read more

(Beirut) – Tunisian authorities have ramped up their crackdown on media and freedom of expression in recent weeks, sentencing two journalists and a media founder to prison sentences, detaining another media figure, and intimidating private media, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said today. The authorities should immediately release those detained and drop all prosecutions for expression protected under international human rights law.  In the lead-up to Tunisia’s first presidential election since President Kais Saied’s July 2021 power grab, expected to be held in the fall, the ..read more

Click to expand Image The sign outside the Notre-Dame church after the killings in May 2014, Fatima neighborhood, Bangui, Central African Republic, June 24, 2014. © 2014 Lewis Mudge/Human Rights Watch (Nairobi) – Those responsible for a brutal attack 10 years ago on a Central African Republic church serving as a camp for displaced people still need to face justice, Human Rights Watch said today. The May 28, 2014 attack at the Notre-Dame church in the Fatima neighborhood of the country’s capital, Bangui, took place less than a kilometer from African Union (AU) peacekeeping forces and ..read more