Human Rights Watch News
Iran: UN Expands Investigations into Rights Violations
Click to expand Image Overview during the 55th session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, February 26, 2024. © 2024 Janine Schmitz/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images (Geneva) – The United Nations Human Rights Council’s adoption of a resolution to continue the Fact-Finding Mission on Iran and significantly broaden the scope of its investigations is a crucial step for tackling the deepening crisis of impunity in Iran, Human Rights Watch said today. The Fact-Finding Mission on Iran, advocated for by a large number of human rights groups, including Human Rights Watch, was originally established amid the deadly state crackdown on the Woman, Life, Freedom protests of 2022. The mission will now have the mandate to monitor and investigate allegations of recent and ongoing serious human rights violations; establish the facts, circumstances, and structural causes of such violations; and collect, consolidate, analyze, and preserve evidence of violations with a view to facilitate future…
States Take Steps Toward Reforming Economic Approaches with Rights
Click to expand Image The United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland, June 13, 2022. © 2022 Valentin Flauraud/Keystone via AP Photo On April 3, the United Nations Human Rights Council adopted by consensus a resolution about “the realization in all countries of economic, social and cultural rights”. This year’s text focuses on the importance of development financing in fulfilling these rights.The resolution, which has been adopted regularly since 2007, addresses for the first time key issues in global economic debates, such as international tax cooperation, debt, public services, and climate finance. These topics, relevant for the realization of rights everywhere, are particularly important to countries in the Global South which are primarily affected by the structural inequalities in a global economic system designed to favor wealthier states.The broad engagement by UN member states during the resolution’s negotiation and its adoption by consensus show the topic’s importance and the…
UN: Treaty on Older People’s Rights Moves Ahead
Click to expand Image The United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland, June 13, 2022. © 2022 Valentin Flauraud/Keystone via AP Photo (Geneva, April 3, 2025) – The United Nations Human Rights Council on April 3, 2025, began an intergovernmental process to draft an international human rights treaty on older people, Human Rights Watch said today. The consensus resolution is an important victory for human rights and multilateralism at a moment of increasing international uncertainty.Older people around the world experience a wide range of human rights violations on a daily basis. They include violence and mistreatment; age-based discrimination; social, economic, and political exclusion; denial of access to care and support services; inadequate social security; exclusion from climate change responses; and abuses in armed conflict.“The UN Human Rights Council’s decision to pursue an international treaty on the rights of older people is a landmark victory not just for older people,…
US: End Campaign of Draconian Campus Arrests
Click to expand Image Pro-Palestinian student protesters at a demonstration at Columbia University on the third day of "Gaza Solidarity Encampment" in New York, US, April 19, 2024. © 2024 Selcuk Acar/Anadolu via Getty Images (Washington, DC) – The US government should end its sweeping effort to arbitrarily arrest and deport international students and scholars in retaliation for their political viewpoints and activism related to Palestine, Human Rights Watch said today. The administration’s statements and actions reveal that its justifications for the arrests and planned deportations are illegitimate and false. The recent spate of arrests is part of a wider crackdown on noncitizen students and academics. The administration, which seeks to punish and deter Palestine activism on university campuses across the country, also says it has revoked hundreds of student visas. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) claims, without any credible explanation, that students’ and scholars’ activism is harmful to…
Argentina: Abusive Response to Protest
A riot police officer shoots a tear gas canister at protesters during a demonstration of pensioners calling for improvements to their pensions and access to free medicines, among other demands, in Buenos Aires on March 12, 2025. © LUIS ROBAYO/AFP via Getty Images (Washington, DC) – Argentine authorities should investigate security forces’ use of force to confront a protest led by pensioners and review an “anti-protest” protocol that opens the door to abuse, Human Rights Watch said today. On March 12, 2025, hundreds of pensioners gathered outside Argentina’s National Congress in Buenos Aires calling for improvements to their pensions and access to free medicines, among other demands. Hundreds of soccer fans and some “barra bravas” – hardcore supporters of particular Argentine soccer clubs who have been implicated in episodes of violent disorder –joined the protest. Some protesters committed acts of violence, including throwing stones and sidewalk debris at the police…
Burkina Faso’s Relentless Crackdown on Dissent, Media
Click to expand Image A screenshot of the list of individuals “actively wanted for criminal association in relation to a terrorist enterprise” published by Burkinabe security minister on April, 1, 2025. The list includes prominent critics of the junta, April 1, 2025. © 2025 MATDS Burkina Faso/Facebook “I rose through the ranks!” joked Maixent Somé, an exiled Burkinabè activist and critic of the country's military junta on X yesterday, after learning that his name appears on a list of wanted terrorists. On April 1, Burkina Faso’s security minister published a list of individuals who are “actively wanted for criminal association in relation to a terrorist enterprise,” and called on the public to provide information on their whereabouts.Among those wanted are Jafar Dicko, head of the Al-Qaeda-linked Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wa al-Muslimeen, JNIM), which has been fighting Burkina Faso’s armed forces since 2016,…
New Risks from Latest Scheme under Italy-Albania Immigration Deal
Click to expand Image A member of the Italian Army stands in front of an immigration detention camp built by Italy in Gjader, Albania, October 11, 2024. © 2024 Florion Goga/Reuters After building immigration facilities in Albania that now stand empty, the Italian government has decided to turn one of them into an offshore detention center. But this will only replicate the problems already seen in detention centers within Italy.The facility in Gjader, Albania, was built to accommodate and process adult male asylum seekers that Italian ships interdicted or rescued at sea. Under the 2023 agreement between Italy and Albania, men from countries Italy considers “safe” would be disembarked directly in Albania, across the Adriatic Sea from Italy, and subjected to a fast-track asylum procedure on the presumption they wouldn’t need protection.But Italy’s courts forced the government to bring to Italy the handful of men taken to Albania under this…
Hungary: Arrest, Don’t Welcome ICC Fugitive Netanyahu
Click to expand Image Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, left, is welcomed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem, July 19, 2018. © 2018 Debbie Hill/AP Photo (Washington, DC) – Hungary should deny entry to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or arrest him if he enters the country, Human Rights Watch said today. Netanyahu’s office announced that he is planning to travel to Hungary on April 2, 2025, following an invitation by Prime Minister Viktor Orban. Netanyahu is subject to an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) on November 21, 2024, when the court’s judges issued arrest warrants against him and Yoav Gallant, his then-defense minister, for crimes against humanity and war crimes committed in the Gaza Strip from at least October 8, 2023. These include starving civilians, intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population, murder, and persecution. Human Rights Watch has documented war crimes, crimes…
