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.
실험실에서 만들어낸 혐중 그리고 4년이 흘렀다. 서울뉴시스이다솜 기자, 김경민 인턴기자 숭실대학교가 기숙사 레지던스홀 규정을 위반해 강제 퇴사 조치된 학생들의 징계 사실을 공지하면서 해당 학생들의 국적을 중국이라고 명시해 논란이 일고 있다. 17 3,527,484 공지 팁유용추천 슬기로운 더쿠생활 더쿠 이용팁 3965 20. 윤석열 대통령의 탄핵 정국으로 인해 양극단으로 나눠진 여야의 지지층이 결집하면서 진보 진영의 반미반일 선동 행태와 유사한 보수 진영의 반북반중 반발 시위 read more.
| 2,841,724 공지 팁유용추천 더쿠에 쉽게 동영상을 올려보자. | 더불어민주당은 17일 올해 신고만 330건으로 폭증한 캄보디아 현지 한국인 납치감금에 관해 국민의힘이 캄보디아 사태 근원을 중국 탓으로 몰아가고 있다며 경주 아시아태평양경제협력체 apec 회의를 앞두고 특정 국가를 자극하는 발언은 외교관계에 부담만 줄 뿐이라고 입단속을. | 일본은 예전에 잘 살았어서 그걸 부러워했던 세대가 있음. | 혐중 확산을 막기 위해선 다각적인 접근. |
|---|---|---|---|
| 중국 남부 도시 광저우에 사는 케이29는 자신의 10대 시절은 k팝과 한국드라마를. | Me5ap4gwru 전략 위험한 불장난 멈춰야 전문가들은 독버섯처럼 퍼지고 있는 혐중을 방관할 경우 우리 사회가 큰 대가를 치를 것이라고 경고한다. | 최근 윤 대통령 탄핵 반대집회와 가짜뉴스를 통해 더욱 증폭되고 있는 혐중 정서는, 누구에 의해 어떤 의도로, 어떻게 고조되고 또 확산되는 걸까요. | 하지만 2025년 현재, 반중이라는 표현으로는 부족한 극단적인 중국 혐오, 혐중 현상이 위험수위를 넘고 있습니다. |
| 반중을 자양분으로 삼는 정도가 아니다. | 가장 극단적인 예시가 쌍십절 인육 사냥 괴담이다. | Net › square › 3668644746더쿠 혐중 카르텔 초등학생까지 번진 혐중&nldr. | 정치적인 목적을 갖고 중국에 대한 무분별한 혐오감을 의도적으로 조장하고 있는 혐중 카르텔, 어제 보도해드렸죠. |
| 혐중 카르텔 초등학생까지 번진 혐중‥학폭에 왕따까지. | 특정 온라인 커뮤니티와 유튜브에선 중국을 겨냥한 온갖 음모론을 담은 콘텐츠가 불티나게 소비되고, 2030세대 사이에서 반중 反中을 넘어 혐중. | ㄴ 부정선거부터 시작해서 대통령이 친중이라는 프레임을 씌우고 아무렇지 않게 가짜뉴스 뿌리고 다니기 그리고 최근 무비자 입국이라는 걸. | Net › square › 3921265915더쿠 오늘도 명동 인근서 혐중 시위200명 행진 신고. |
저새끼들 더쿠에 개소리 싸지르고 그걸 한국인 반응이라고 번역 우리나라 짱깨 혐중지수가 일본과 더불어 전세계 투탑임.. 특히 대학가에서 탄핵반대 집회가 read more.. 30 4,082,895 공지 팁유용추천 스퀘어 공지 스퀘어 저격판 사용 무통보 차단 주의 1236 18.. Net › square › 3636423105더쿠 너 중국인이지탄핵 정국 속 캠퍼스로 번진 ‘혐중 정서’..
Days ago 이슈 롯데제과에서 홈런볼 견제하려고 만들었던 과자 2,095 9. 혐중 시위 확산과 함께 최근 버스정류장, 공연장 등에서 중국인이 이유 없이 폭행당하는 사건도 잇따르고 있습니다, 지난 17일 서울의 ‘작은 중국’이라고 불리는 광진구 자양동 건국대 인근 ‘양꼬치 거리’에서 과잠을 입은 청년들이 혐중 시위를 하고 있다. 나는 저거 단속안하는 기관들 문제라고 봄 저렇게 지나가는 일반인들한테 협박하고 윽박지르고 폭력까지 쓰면 당연히 감방에 쳐넣어야지 왜 안 쳐넣어 11. 온라인 커뮤니티 등을 중심으로 반중 反中을 넘어 혐중 嫌中감정이 팽배해지고 있다. Kr 극우 세력의 혐오 선동을 방지할 제도적 대안 마련이 시급하다는 요구도 나왔다.
대물남 트위터 위험 수위를 넘어선 혐중 시위의 실체. 무명의 더쿠 혐한이나 혐중이나 같이 손잡고 나가라 좀. 특히 대학가에서 탄핵반대 집회가 read more. 짱x 대륙으로 꺼져라 반중 시위대에냅다 커피 뿌린 여성. 30 4,082,895 공지 팁유용추천 스퀘어 공지 스퀘어 저격판 사용 무통보 차단 주의 1236 18. 능욕당하는 천사
누비니니피자니니 중국에 대해 비난하지만 정작 제대로 된 사실도 아닌 틀린 주장을 단지 중국을 욕한다는 이유로 전부 합리화하거나 혐중 정서에 호소해 자신의 주장의 정당성을 주장하는 용도로 혐중 정서를 악용하기도 한다. 부동산중개업체에서 좀처럼 방을 보여주지 않은데다 그나마 소개한 방은 월세가 터무니 없이 비쌌다. 무명의 더쿠 혐한이나 혐중이나 같이 손잡고 나가라 좀. 짱x 대륙으로 꺼져라 반중 시위대에냅다 커피 뿌린 여성. 김희교 교수도 혐중이 1020배의 혐한으로 돌아올 것은 자명하다며 위험한 불장난을 멈춰야 한다고 강조했다. 더리조트 다시보기
대나무 행주 중국인 디시 이처럼 일본에서는 안보, 경제, 외교 분야에서 중국에 적대적인 혐중 성향이 지배적이고, 특히 넷우익들은 결코 중국과 경제적으로 연관성이 있어서는 안 된다고 주장한다. 청년층 스며든 반중 정서 자극해 혐중 몰이 보수의 위험한. 혐중 확산을 막기 위해선 다각적인 접근. 서울 도심에서 반중反中 시위를 벌이는 시위대에게 한 여성이 커피를 뿌리는 영상이 사회관계망서비스sns에서 논쟁을 일으키고 있다. 지난 17일 서울의 ‘작은 중국’이라고 불리는 광진구 자양동 건국대 인근 ‘양꼬치 거리’에서 과잠을 입은 청년들이 혐중 시위를 하고 있다. 눈나 意味
닉앤 니콜 나무위키 이후 이들 단체는 중국인이 밀집한 서울 영등포구 대림동 등으로 옮겨 활동을 이어가 논란이 잦아들지 않고 있다. 일부 정치인들마저 혐중을 부추기면서 국익은 물론, 사회 갈등을 심화시키고 있다는 비판이 나오고 있습니다. 혐중 카르텔 혐중으로 대통령 지키기‥혐중 중심에 선. 미국과 중국 간의 화웨이 문제 등으로 인해 제2의 사드 고고도미사일방어체계 thaad보복 우려도 제기되고 있는 가운데, 중국에 대한 심리적 거리는 시간이 지날 수록 멀어지고 있다는 우려도 제기되고 있다. 혐중 현수막, 보수 시민도 65%가 불쾌.
대구 암웨이 일부 정치인들마저 혐중을 부추기면서 국익은 물론, 사회 갈등을 심화시키고 있다는 비판이 나오고 있습니다. 고든 창변호사 어제, 미국 메릴랜드 옥슨힐 서울 거리엔 이름표를 붙이지 않은, 수상하고 폭력적인 경찰관들이 있습니다. 이슈 일본도 혐중, 혐쿠르드 시위로 바꿈 2,454 11. 나는 저거 단속안하는 기관들 문제라고 봄 저렇게 지나가는 일반인들한테 협박하고 윽박지르고 폭력까지 쓰면 당연히 감방에 쳐넣어야지 왜 안 쳐넣어 11. Days ago 이슈 롯데제과에서 홈런볼 견제하려고 만들었던 과자 2,095 9.
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.
노골적인 혐중 노래도 떼지어 부릅니다., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.