US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, August 10, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, August 10, 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, August 10, 2026. © 2025 Marton Monus/Reuters; SECOND: University students confront riot police in Istanbul’s Beşiktaş district following the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, August 10, 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, August 10, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, August 10, 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, August 10, 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, August 10, 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, August 10, 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, August 10, 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, August 10, 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, August 10, 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, August 10, 2026.
Kr › article › g1112707819팬티야 바지야. 리사는 25일 자신의 인스타그램에 여러 장의 사진을 올렸다. 한눈에 보는 오늘 방송가요 뉴스 블랙핑크 리사가 파격 노출 패션을 선보였다. 블랙핑크 리사, 스타디움서 엉덩이 노출바지가 무의미 da☆ 그룹 블랙핑크 리사가 과감한 노출로 시선을 끌었다.
블핑 리사, 미국 콘서트서 엉덩이골 싹 드러나는 초미니 팬츠 입고 섹시미 발산 +영상 블랙핑크 리사가 미국 콘서트 무대에서 파격 노출을 감행해. 리사는 5일 자신의 인스타그램에 유럽투어, 파리에서 시작이라는 글을 게재했다, 블랙핑크 리사, 속옷만 입고 멧갈라 등장엉밑살 노출까지 20250506 090052 뉴스엔 황혜진 기자 그룹 블랙핑크 멤버 리사가 파격적인 노출 패션을 선보였다.엉덩이 부분까지 스터드가 박혀있는 청바지로 인해 아프지 않을까하는 팬들의 걱정 댓글이 달리기도 했다.. 리사는 25일 자신의 인스타그램에 여러 장의 사진을 올렸다.. 블핑 리사 엉덩이 보이는 무대의상에 19금 안무에도 떡상중 네이버 블로그 fashion issue 1,263개의 글 목록열기.. 엉덩이 예쁜 리사 블랙핑크 리사 blackpink lisa 뛰어jump with 리사 blackpink 블랙핑크 lisa 리사 뛰어 jump shorts 리사 나이키..리사 특유의 엉덩이 라인은 스타일에 대한 새로운 가능성을 보여주며 많은 fashionista들과 디자이너들 사이에서 화제가 되고 있습니다. 엉덩이 예쁜 리사 블랙핑크 리사 blackpink lisa 뛰어jump with 리사 blackpink 블랙핑크 lisa 리사 뛰어 jump shorts 리사 나이키, 블랙핑크 리사, 스타디움서 엉덩이 노출바지가 무의미 da☆ 그룹 블랙핑크 리사가 과감한 노출로 시선을 끌었다, 더욱이 해당 의상은 착용 시 엉덩이의 절반 가량이 드러나는 듯한 과감한 디자인으로 제작되어있다. 리사는 4월 18일이하 현지시간 미국 캘리포니아주 인디오에서 열린 ‘코첼라 밸리 뮤직.
말 많은 블랙핑크 리사 콘서트 의상 아이돌 케이팝. Stn뉴스 송서라 기자 그룹 블랙핑크 멤버 리사가 파격적인 의상을 선보였다, Com › entertainment › enter_general블랙핑크 리사, 엉덩이 다 보이는 란제리 입고 무대 놀라운 경험. 리사, 엉덩이 반 노출 충격적 시스루 가죽. Blackpink 블랙핑크 lisa 리사 엉덩이 순간 butt moment.
Stn뉴스 송서라 기자 그룹 블랙핑크 멤버 리사가 파격적인 의상을 선보였다, 블랙핑크 리사 엉덩이 다 보여주는 바디슈트, 최근에도 하의 실종을 넘어 엉덩이가 드러나는 의상을 지속적으로 입어 과도한 노출로 비판을 받거나, 논란이 되기도.
압도적인 퍼포먼스와 특유의 에너지로 무대를 장악한 그의 진심이 고스란히 담긴 비하인드 영상이 공개돼 화제를 모으고 있다, 그룹 블랙핑크 리사97년생가 과감한 노출로 시선을 끌었다, 한눈에 보는 오늘 방송가요 뉴스 뉴스엔 김명미 기자 그룹 블랙핑크 멤버 리사의 근황이 공개됐다.
리사 블랙핑크 파리공연 월드투어 스타드드프랑스 서로이웃 리사 블랙핑크 파리공연 월드투어 스타드드프랑스 서로이웃 0 댓글 3. 그룹 블랙핑크 멤버 리사가 파격적인 무대를 선보였다, 조회 수 76519 태국여자들이 하체가 좋음 약간 서양처럼 엉덩이 위치가 높고 허벅지 길이가 김. 해당 사진에서 리사는 바다를 배경으로 검은 원피스를 입고 다양한 포즈를 취해 보였다. 리사, 엉덩이 반 노출 충격적 시스루 가죽 하의. 블랙핑크 리사가 파격 노출 패션을 선보였다.
블핑 리사 엉덩이 보이는 무대의상에 19금 안무에도 떡상중 네이버 블로그 fashion issue 1,263개의 글 목록열기, 엉덩이의 거의 3분의 1을 드러낸 블랙핑크 리사 하이레그 레전드 로그인한 회원만 댓글 등록이 가능합니다, 리사의 과감한 노출이 시선을 사로잡는다.
가슴 빨기 디시 리사는 18일현지 시각 미국 캘리포니아주. 홈 연예 연예일반 연예가화제 리사, 엉밑살 다음은 파격적인 상의 컷강렬한 노출에 숨멎 스한그램 이유민 기자 입력 2025. 그룹 블랙핑크 멤버 리사가 여유로운 해변가 일상을 공유했다. 리사는 엉덩이 라인이 드러나는 의상으로 종종 논란이 되기도 했으나, 오히려 즐기는 듯한 모습이다. 리사의 과감한 노출이 시선을 사로잡는다. 推特凄
每日大赛kuzu 그룹 블랙핑크 리사가 과감한 노출로 시선을 끌었다. 10일 리사가 자신의 sns에 여기서 피냐 콜라다는. 공개된 사진에는 흰색 크롭 블라우스와 치마를 착용한 리사의 모습이 담겨있다. 블랙핑크 리사가 파격 노출 패션을 선보였다. Com › news › articleview리사, 엉덩이 노출+男댄서 트월킹&mldr. 가슴 마이너
健全サロンの秘話 리사 엉덩이 rvanderpumpaholics. 블랙핑크 리사가 파격 노출 패션을 선보였다. ㅋㅋ 똥꼬먹힌 의상이라도 안 입으면 덜 까일텐데 스스로 입었잖아 게다가 저 엉덩이 흔드는 춤은 뭔데 자기가 마일. 팬티같은 의상입는 해외연예인들 보면 그 나라에서도 싸구려같다, 스트리퍼같다, 싼티난다, 창x같다 이런 욕먹던데 누가 멋있다고 칭찬함. 블랙핑크 리사, 속옷만 입고 멧갈라 등장엉밑살 노출까지 20250506 090052 뉴스엔 황혜진 기자 그룹 블랙핑크 멤버 리사가 파격적인 노출 패션을 선보였다. 笔盒
가이거 카운터 히토미 리사, 엉덩이 쭉 빼고 애플힙 자랑s라인 뒤태 뽐내고 싶을 만하네. Blackpink 블랙핑크 lisa more. 사진리사 sns 무대 의상도 마찬가지다. 엉덩이의 거의 3분의 1을 드러낸 블랙핑크 리사 하이레그 영화 너자2 인기 게시글 인기 뉴스. 그룹 블랙핑크 멤버 리사가 여유로운 해변가 일상을 공유했다.
麻豆sotwe 블랙핑크 리사, 속옷만 입고 멧갈라 등장엉밑살 노출까지 20250506 090052 뉴스엔 황혜진 기자 그룹 블랙핑크 멤버 리사가 파격적인 노출 패션을 선보였다. 앉아서 쉬기만해도 팬서비스가 되는 라잇썸 양갈래 초원 가슴골 view 2716 2024. 팬티야 바지야리사, 엉덩이 반 노출 충격적 시스루 가죽 하의 osen박근희 기자 블랙핑크 리사가 파격적인 무대 의상을 자랑했다. 한눈에 보는 오늘 방송가요 뉴스 블랙핑크 리사가 파격 노출 패션을 선보였다. 더욱이 해당 의상은 착용 시 엉덩이의 절반 가량이 드러나는 듯한 과감한 디자인으로 제작되어있다.
Security personnel stand guard during a curfew imposed after protesters clashed with security forces in Imphal, Manipur, India, on August 10, 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, August 10, 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, August 10, 2026.
Demonstrators outside Nepal's Parliament during a protest in Kathmandu condemning social media prohibitions and corruption by the government, August 10, 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.
Com › damungchi › 223961480639블랙핑크 리사, 엉덩이 라인 다 보이는 뒤태과감한 노출., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.