US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, June 19, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 19, 2026.
The global human rights system is in peril. Under relentless pressure from US President Donald Trump, and persistently undermined by China and Russia, the rules-based international order is being crushed, threatening to take with it the architecture human rights defenders have come to rely on to advance norms and protect freedoms. To defy this trend, governments that still value human rights, alongside social movements, civil society, and international institutions, need to form a strategic alliance to push back.
To be fair, the downward spiral predated Trump’s reelection. The democratic wave that began over 50 years ago has given way to what scholars term a “democratic recession.” Democracy is now back to 1985 levels according to some metrics, with 72 percent of the world’s population now living under autocracy. Russia and China are less free today than 20 years ago. And so is the United States.
Of course, democracy is not a panacea for human rights violations; the US and other longtime democracies have their own histories of colonial crimes, racism, abusive justice systems, and wartime atrocities. More recently, authoritarian leaders have exploited public mistrust and anger to win elections and then dismantled the very institutions that brought them to power. Democratic institutions are crucial to represent the will of the people and keep power in check. It’s no surprise that whenever democracy is undermined, rights are too, as evident in recent years in India, Türkiye, the Philippines, El Salvador, and Hungary.
FIRST: The Momentum Movement’s parliamentary representative David Bedo and independent member of parliament Akos Hadhazy protest against a law that bans Pride marches in Hungary and imposes fines on organizers and attendees of such events, Budapest, June 19, 2026. © 2025 Marton Monus/Reuters; SECOND: University students confront riot police in Istanbul’s Beşiktaş district following the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, June 19, 2026. © 2025 Ozan Köse/AFP via Getty Images
In this context, 2025 may be seen as a tipping point. In just 12 months, the Trump administration has carried out a broad assault on key pillars of US democracy and the global rules-based order, which the US, despite inconsistencies, was, with other states, instrumental in helping to establish.
In short order, Trump’s second-term administration has undermined trust in the sanctity of elections, reduced government accountability, gutted food assistance and healthcare subsidies, attacked judicial independence, defied court orders, rolled back women’s rights, obstructed access to abortion care, undermined remedies for racial harm, terminated programs mandating accessibility for people with disabilities, punished free speech, stripped protections from trans and intersex people, eroded privacy, and used government power to intimidate political opponents, the media, law firms, universities, civil society, and even comedians.
Claiming a risk of “civilizational erasure” in Europe and leaning on racist tropes to cast entire populations as unwelcome in the US, the Trump administration has embraced policies and rhetoric that align with white nationalist ideology. Immigrants and asylum seekers have been subjected to inhumane conditions and degrading treatment; 32 died in US Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody in 2025, and as of mid-January 2026, an additional 4 have died. Masked immigration enforcement agents have targeted people of color, using excessive force, terrorizing communities, wrongfully arresting scores of citizens, and, most recently, unjustifiably killing two people in Minneapolis, whose deaths Human Rights Watch has documented.
The US president of course has the authority to tighten US borders and enforce stricter immigration policies. The administration is not, however, entitled to deny legal process to asylum seekers, mistreat undocumented migrants, or unlawfully discriminate. In a well-functioning democracy, no electoral mandate should supersede domestic legislation, constitutional protections, or international human rights law. Trump’s team has repeatedly bypassed these guardrails.
The violations have not stopped at the border. The Trump administration used a 1798 law to send hundreds of Venezuelan migrants to an infamous prison in El Salvador, where they were tortured and sexually abused. Its blatantly unlawful strikes on boats in the Caribbean and the Pacific extrajudicially killed more than 120 people whom Trump claims were drug traffickers.
US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, June 19, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, June 19, 2026.
After the US attacked Venezuela and apprehended its president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, Trump claimed the US would “run” the country and control its vast oil reserves. Despite paying lip service to human rights concerns under Maduro at the United Nations, Trump has worked with the same repressive apparatus to further US interests. Many Western allies have chosen to stay silent about these lawless moves, perhaps fearing erratic tariffs and blowback to their alliances.
Trump’s foreign policy has upended the foundations of the rules-based order that seeks to advance democracy and human rights, even if imperfectly.
Trump has boasted that he doesn’t “need international law” as a constraint, only his “own morality.” His administration has politicized the US State Department’s annual human rights report, stepped away from the global prohibition on antipersonnel landmines, voiced support for rewriting international rules on asylum, and skipped the UN’s Universal Periodic Review of the US’ human rights record.
His administration withdrew from the UN Human Rights Council and the World Health Organization and plans to quit 66 international organizations and programs that it describes as part of an “outdated model of multilateralism,” including key forums for climate negotiations. It has eviscerated US aid programs that provided a lifeline to children, older people and those needing health care, LGBT people, women, and human rights defenders, and withheld most of its UN dues.
Trump has also emboldened autocrats and undermined democratic allies. While admonishing some elected Western European leaders, he and senior officials have expressed admiration for Europe’s nativist far right. He has favored autocrats such as Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Türkiye’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele, while continuing decades of US support to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.
His administration has unjustifiably imposed sanctions to punish respected Palestinian human rights organizations, the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) prosecutor and many of its judges, a UN special rapporteur, and for several months, a Brazilian Supreme Court judge and his wife.
The institutional response in the US to Trump’s power grabs has been shockingly muted. Much of Congress, controlled by his own party, has not challenged his supercharged expansion of executive power. The leaders of the US’ most powerful technology companies have made significant donations and sought to placate the president. Some big law firms and prestigious universities have made deals rather than assert their independence, and some media organizations seem afraid to attract the president’s ire.
Has the US switched sides on the human rights playing field? While US engagement with human rights institutions has always been selective, China and Russia have long pursued an illiberal agenda. They stand much to gain from a US government that now expresses open hostility to universal rights. China and Russia remain strategic rivals of the US, but all three countries are now led by leaders who share open disdain for norms and institutions that could constrain their power.
Police detain an activist outside the State Duma, the lower house of the Russian parliament, before lawmakers approved a bill that punishes online searches for information that is deemed “extremist,” in Moscow, June 19, 2026.
Together, they wield considerable economic, military, and diplomatic power. If they were to consistently act as allies of convenience to erode global rules, they could threaten the entire system. Already, a loose international network of countries such as North Korea, Iran, Venezuela, Myanmar, Cuba, and Belarus work in concert with Russia and China. These leaders share very little ideologically but align in undermining human rights and promoting a regressive international agenda. In word and in practice, the US government is now helping them in this endeavor.
FIRST: Surveillance cameras installed in Lhasa, Tibet Autonomous Region, June 19, 2026. © 2025 Kyodo News via Getty Images; SECOND: A television in a restaurant in Hong Kong shows a missile being launched during military exercises being held by China around the island of Taiwan, June 19, 2026. © 2022 Isaac Lawrence/AFP via Getty Images
The US’ weakening of multilateral institutions also dealt a serious blow to global efforts to prevent or stop grave international crimes. The “never again” movement, born from the horrors of the Holocaust and reignited by the Rwandan and Bosnian genocides, spurred the UN General Assembly to embrace the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) in 2005. Meant to guide international intervention to prevent and stop atrocities in tandem with efforts to prosecute and punish serious crimes, R2P made a real difference in places like the Central African Republic and Kenya.
Today, R2P is rarely invoked and the ICC is under siege. In addition to Trump’s far-reaching sanctions, in December 2025 a Moscow court sentenced the ICC prosecutor and eight of its judges to prison terms in absentia. Moreover, despite being ICC fugitives, in 2025, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin was welcomed by Donald Trump in Alaska, and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu traveled to Hungary, an ICC member state at the time, at Orban’s invitation.
Twenty years ago, the US government and civil society were instrumental in galvanizing a response to mass atrocities in Darfur. Sudan is burning again, but this time under Trump, with relative impunity. Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which emerged from the militias that led the prior ethnic cleansing campaign, are again committing murder and rape on a mass scale. A growing body of evidence indicates that the UAE, a longtime US ally that recently made multi-billion-dollar deals with Trump, is providing the RSF with military support.
A former bus station turned into internally displaced person settlement in Gedaref, Sudan, June 19, 2026.
In the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the Israeli armed forces have committed acts of genocide, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity, killing over 70,000 people since the October 2023 Hamas-led attacks on Israel and displacing the vast majority of Gaza’s population. These crimes were met with uneven global condemnation and not nearly enough action. Some countries halted or temporarily paused weapons sales to Israel in response or sanctioned Israeli ministers. Trump, however, continued a long-standing US policy of almost unconditional support to Israel, even as the International Court of Justice is weighing allegations of genocide and has issued binding orders under the Genocide Convention to protect Palestinians’ rights.
Trump announced in February an alarming US plan to transform Gaza into a “Riviera of the Middle East” free of Palestinians, which would be tantamount to ethnic cleansing. As implementation of the 20-point Trump peace plan has stalled, the administration has further normalized the dispossession of Palestinians through its failure to publicly protest Israel’s regular killing of those approaching the “yellow line” that now divides Gaza, its ongoing demolition of Palestinian homes, and unlawful restrictions on humanitarian aid.
FIRST: A Palestinian girl stands amidst rubble in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip, June 19, 2026. © 2025 Bashar Taleb/AFP via Getty Images; SECOND: Palestinians inspect a house demolished by Israeli military forces in the town of Qabatiya in the Israeli occupied West Bank, June 19, 2026. © 2025 Nasser Ishtayeh/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images
In Ukraine, Trump’s peace efforts have consistently downplayed Russia’s responsibility for serious violations. These include indiscriminate bombing, coercing Ukrainians in occupied areas to serve in the Russian military, systematic torture of Ukrainian prisoners of war, the abduction and deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia, and the use of quadcopter drones to hunt and kill civilians. Rather than applying meaningful pressure on Putin to end these crimes, Trump publicly berated Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in a made-for-TV dressing down, demanded an exploitative mineral deal, pressured Ukraine’s authorities to concede large swaths of territory, and proposed “full amnesty” for war crimes.
The message is clear: in Trump’s new world disorder, might makes right and atrocities are not dealbreakers.
A man stands in the courtyard of his house following a Russian strike on the outskirts of Odesa, Ukraine, June 19, 2026.
이시가키 섬 완벽 가이드북 2025년 최신판 여행 정보부터 추천 코스까지 일본 최남단의 보석, 이시가키 섬. 하와이 꽃나무에서 추출한 다양한 종류의 하와이안 아로마 를 고객에 맞게 선택해 고객에 맞는 절차로 시술합니다. 琉球リラクゼーションcloudnine|오키나와 이시가키지마 류큐 휴식. 하와이 꽃나무에서 추출한 다양한 종류의 하와이안 아로마 를 고객에 맞게 선택해 고객에 맞는 절차로 시술합니다.
Spa agarosa is temporary closed due to facility maintenance, 또한, 이시가키지마의 특산품을 구매할 수 있는 기념품 숍과 휴게시설, 마사지 숍도 마련되어 있다, 지금 클룩에서 이시가키 섬 마사지 서비스를 최저가 예약하고 편안한 휴식을 즐기세요. 여러분 모두 꼭 스노클링 체험하러 오시길 강력 추천합니다. Com › entry › 이시가키여행꿀팁이시가키 여행 꿀팁 총정리, 초보자 완벽 가이드 2025.| 9 1774件の体験談 大人 中学生以上1人あたり 13,500 6,900 円税込. | Kr › attractionsg298223이시가키 스파 best 10 tripadvisor 트립어드바이저. | Ana intercontinental ishigaki resort는 신 이시가키 공항new ishigaki airport에서 차로 20분 거리에 있습니다. |
|---|---|---|
| 개인정보처리방침 이메일무단수집거부 찾아오시는길 국민건강보험 전문도서관 강원특별자치도 원주시 건강로 32 반곡동 국민건강보험공단 지하 1층 전문도서관 tel. | 이시가키 섬은 일본 오키나와에서 아름다운 자연경관과 다채로운 문화가 어우러진 인기 여행지입니다. | 보는 것만으론 부족하니까, 와그에서 세상의 모든 경험을 발견해보세요. |
| 해외여행 35개의 글 목록열기 활동정보. | のプランページは現在予約できません。 予約の受付、掲載が終了した可能性が. | 지금 클룩에서 이시가키 섬 마사지 서비스를 최저가 예약하고 편안한 휴식을 즐기세요. |
해외여행 35개의 글 목록열기 활동정보. 특히, 후사키 리조트는 가족 여행, 커플 여행, 혼자만의 힐링 여행 모두에 적합한 숙소로 많은 사랑을 받고 있습니다. Kr copyright ⓒ national health insurance service. 이시가키지마 한눈에 보기일본 오키나와현 최남단에 위치한 이시가키지마石垣島는 야에야마 제도의 중심 섬으로, 에메랄드빛 바다와 산호초, 아열대 정글을 간직한 천혜의 자연 휴양지입니다.
족욕 → 마사지 → 차의 순서로 보상의 시간이라는 말이 딱 맞습니다.. 이시가키 섬 바다는 매우 맑고 투명하며 거대한 산호초와 아름다운 다양한 해양 생물을 볼 수 있습니다..
Agarosa 스파 ana 인터컨티넨탈 이시가키 리조트 공식. 90분이라는 넉넉한 코스를 받았습니다, Ana 인터컨티넨탈 이시가키 할인 받고 예약하기 인터컨티넨탈 아나 이시가키 리조트 3541 maezato, ishigaki, okinawa 9070002 일본 인터컨티넨탈이시가키 이시가키리조트 오키나와리조트.
공항과 낙도로 가는 교통이 편리한 입지 조건입니다. 3박5일, 땡처리전용 푸꾸옥 자유여행 5일 베스트 웨스턴 디럭스룸 공항근처 발마사지 공항픽업 천원의 행복, 681,200원. 이 가게의 특징은 친절한 서비스가 특징입니다, Com › entry › 이시가키여행꿀팁이시가키 여행 꿀팁 총정리, 초보자 완벽 가이드 2025, Kr copyright ⓒ national health insurance service.
mushroomisland 여러분 모두 꼭 스노클링 체험하러 오시길 강력 추천합니다. 보는 것만으론 부족하니까, 와그에서 세상의 모든 경험을 발견해보세요. Agarosa 스파에서 전문 테라피스트들로부터 다양한 메뉴를 즐기실 수 있습니다. 클럽메드 이시가키 카비라, 일본 오키나와 인근의 프리미엄 올인클루시브 리조트. 또한 키즈풀, 키즈 클럽, 마사지 등도 이용하실 수 있습니다. mintmoca3
missed_me_0 sex 다양한 온천 풀과 사우나, 마사지 체험 가능하고 일본 이시가키지마섬 여행 2박3일코스 최적기 예산경비 나트랑. 클럽메드 이시가키 카비라, 일본 오키나와 인근의 프리미엄 올인클루시브 리조트. 태국 전통 마사지 족욕 포함|오키나와 낙도이시가키지마で릴렉제이션・헬스케어が予約できます. Ana intercontinental ishigaki resort는 신 이시가키 공항new ishigaki airport에서 차로 20분 거리에 있습니다. 클럽메드 픽업 샌딩 서비스를 미리 신청하여, 공항으로 마중 나온 클럽메드 직원과 차를 타고 클럽메드로 갔다. mooyoo_fan
missav よしたかねね Spa agarosa is temporary closed due to facility maintenance. 오키나와 본섬 남서쪽, 대만과 제일 가까운 일본 최남단 지역. 족욕 → 마사지 → 차의 순서로 보상의 시간이라는 말이 딱 맞습니다. 오키나와현 지역의 힐링마사지 명소 5 페이지. 족욕 → 마사지 → 차의 순서로 보상의 시간이라는 말이 딱 맞습니다. missav.ai dm
mitsuki 온팬 클럽메드 픽업 샌딩 서비스를 미리 신청하여, 공항으로 마중 나온 클럽메드 직원과 차를 타고 클럽메드로 갔다. 요모조모_해외여행⭐️ 25개의 글 목록열기. 거리의 중심지에 있기 때문에 특산물 등의 쇼핑과 식사에도 매우 편리합니다. 일본 이시가키 섬에서 마사지와 스파를 경험하며 전문 테라피와 고급스러운 서비스로 몸과 마음을 힐링해 보세요. Ana 인터컨티넨탈 이시가키 리조트에서 몸과 마음의 휴식을 취하세요.
mixiporn 石垣島 btree石垣店 ローズ蒸しテント テラヘルツ温熱セラピー マッサージ 疲労回復 이시가키여행 오키나와여행 이시가키힐링 이시가키마사지 이시가키에스테 이시가키스파 로즈테라피 로즈스팀 온열테라피 테라헤르츠 피로회복 힐링타임 石垣. 이시가키 섬 완벽 가이드북 2025년 최신판 여행 정보부터 추천 코스까지 일본 최남단의 보석, 이시가키 섬. Com › publish › plan오키나와 이시가키지마 붓기와 냉증으로 추천. Agarosa 스파 agarosa 스파 이시가키 섬의 은혜를 바탕으로 추천 휴식 서비스. 거리의 중심지에 있기 때문에 특산물 등의 쇼핑과 식사에도 매우 편리합니다.
Security personnel stand guard during a curfew imposed after protesters clashed with security forces in Imphal, Manipur, India, on June 19, 2026.
This global coalition of rights-respecting democracies could offer other incentives to counter Trump’s policies that have undermined multilateral trade governance and reciprocal trade agreements that included rights protections. Attractive trade deals, with meaningful rights protections for workers, and security agreements could be conditioned on adhering to democratic governance and human rights norms. Democracy already comes with benefits. While autocracies have generally fostered conflict, economic stagnation, or kleptocracy, as evidenced in multiple academic studies, including the work of the Nobel Prize-winning economist Daron Acemoglu, democratic institutions reliably yield economic growth.
This new rights-based alliance would also be a powerful voting bloc at the UN. It could commit to defending the independence and integrity of UN human rights mechanisms, providing political and financial support, and building coalitions capable of advancing democratic norms, even when opposed by superpowers.
Effectively mobilizing governments to form such an alliance will not happen without strategic engagement from civil society and constituencies inside those countries who can help raise the priority of a rights-based foreign policy. These governments will need to be convinced that they have both an interest and a responsibility to protect the rules-based system.
Projects of this nature are bubbling up. Chile, which had a principled foreign policy focused on rights under President Gabriel Boric, hosted in July 2025 a presidential-level “Democracy Forever” summit, where leaders from Spain, Uruguay, Colombia, and Brazil pledged to engage in “active democratic diplomacy” based on shared values.
The Hague Group, led by Malaysia, South Africa, and Colombia, formed in January 2025 in “defense of international law” and in solidarity with Palestinians. Over 70 countries from all regions signed a joint statement defending multilateralism at the UN. Earlier, in 2017, former Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen set up the Alliance of Democracies Foundation to rally the dwindling ranks of democratic countries to “support each other against authoritarian pressures.”
Whatever its precise contours, an alliance of rights-respecting democracies would offer a hopeful counterpoint to the authoritarian trope of China’s and Russia’s leaders standing alongside North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, observing military hardware in a parade in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in September. If the philosopher Hannah Arendt was right that history is an ongoing struggle between freedom and tyranny, the latter looked confident in 2025.
Yet, even in the worst of times, the idea of freedom and human rights is enduring. People power remains an engine for change. In the US, “No Kings” marches have drawn millions, protesters in Chicago, Minneapolis, Los Angeles, and around the country have stood up against the deployment of the National Guard and ICE abuses, and students are still organizing for Palestine on university campuses despite draconian crackdowns and visa revocations.
People gather facing law enforcement after marching through downtown Austin, Texas at the conclusion of the "No Kings Day" demonstration in the US, June 19, 2026.
Buoyed by popular resistance, South Korean parliamentarians impeached their president to prevent him from grabbing power through martial law. Grassroots aid efforts by Sudan’s emergency response rooms, Hong Kong’s fire relief, Sri Lanka’s cyclone relief community kitchens, and Ukrainian mutual aid and solidarity collectives represent the best of this trend.
In 2025, Gen Z protests against corruption, inadequate public services, and poor governance in Nepal, Indonesia, and Morocco brought to the forefront the need for governments to listen to their youth and tackle corruption and inequality. But as the difficulties of restoring rights in Bangladesh after years under an authoritarian government illustrates, gains won through public mobilization can easily be lost unless democratic participation and free expression remain unassailable.
People take part in a youth-led protest against corruption and calling for education and healthcare reforms, in Rabat, Morocco, June 19, 2026.
Demonstrators outside Nepal's Parliament during a protest in Kathmandu condemning social media prohibitions and corruption by the government, June 19, 2026.
In this more hostile world, civil society is more critical than ever. It’s also increasingly endangered, particularly in an environment where funding is scarce. In 2025, Human Rights Watch was labeled “undesirable” and banned from operating in Russia. For partners in Egypt, Hong Kong, and India, these tactics are all too familiar. Restrictions on civil society and protest have become more commonplace in Europe, including the UK and France. And now, for the first time, many worry about risks associated with their operational presence in the US, where the Open Society Foundations, a major donor, have already been threatened, and the administration is preparing a list of “domestic terrorists” under overbroad guidance that could be interpreted to include the work of many progressive groups.
Breaking the authoritarian wave and standing up for human rights is a generational challenge. In 2026, it will play out most acutely in the US, with far-reaching consequences for the rest of the world. Fighting back will require a determined, strategic, and coordinated reaction from voters, civil society, multilateral institutions, and rights-respecting governments around the globe.
또한 키즈풀, 키즈 클럽, 마사지 등도 이용하실 수 있습니다., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.