US Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino (C) walks through a department store in St. Paul, Minnesota, August 8, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, August 8, 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 8, 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 8, 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 8, 2026.
A Venezuelan migrant sits inside a cell at CECOT prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, August 8, 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 8, 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 8, 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 8, 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 8, 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 8, 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 8, 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 8, 2026.
한눈에 보는 오늘 e스포츠 뉴스 올해 lck 스토브리그 최대 계약으로 꼽히는 제우스 최우제의 한화생명e스포츠로의 이적을 놓고 전 소속팀인 t1과 최우제의 에이전시가 진실 공방을 벌이고 있다. 20일 t1은 공식 소셜미디어를 통해 탑 라이너 제우스가 팀을 떠난다고 밝혔다. T1의 유망주 선수들로 구성된 t1 루키즈 출신이며 솔로랭크부터 상당한 주목을 받은 선수다 21년도 부터 1군으로 데뷔를했고 22년부터 파괴력이 나왔다. 21 1006 티하인드 시크릿랩에 문매님이 의자체험해보라했을때 제우스 다호냥곰개 조회 수 53370 추천 수 243 댓글 50 s.
| 리그 오브 레전드lol 월드 챔피언십롤드컵 우승팀인 t1의 제우스가 팀을 떠나게 된 가운데 팬들의 반응이 엇갈리고 있다. | Com › view › 20241122n29415제우스 이적 놓고 t1에이전시 진실 공방 네이트 스포츠. |
|---|---|
| 리그오브레전드lol e스포츠 게임단 t1의 3연속 월드 챔피언십 결승 진출, 2연속 우승을 이끌었던 제오페구케 선발 라인업이 제우스 최우제의 이탈로 3년만에 막을 내렸다. | 한눈에 보는 오늘 it과학 뉴스 서울뉴시스 리그 오브 레전드lol롤 e스포츠팀 티원t1은 19일 오후 11시 공식 소셜네트워크서비스sns 채널을 통해 제우스 최우제 계약 종료 소식을 밝혔다. |
| 일반 나 간만에 와서 제우스 t1 떠난거 밝혀짐. | 제우스는 작년 11월 t1과의 계약을 종료하고 한화생명e스포츠로 이적했다. |
| 최근에는 t1이 lck 24연승의 대기록을 세우는 등 좋은 모습을 보여주고 있는데요. | 시장평가 받아보겠다고 fa 나감한화가 1 1 선수옵션에 거액 연봉 오퍼함그거 안 받고 티원에 2년 계약 역오퍼함티원은 1 1 팀옵션 제시함제우스는 3. |
| 29% | 71% |
11월에 ama와 sns로 선수에 과녁만들어서 매장시켜버림 우린 악의가 없었는데 님들이 오해한거임 업계 최고 대우를 해주려고 했다 제우스 배신자 유다.. 리그오브레전드lol 프로 게이머 제우스본명 최우제가 t1과의 계약 종료에 대한 입장을 밝혔다.. 하지만 제우스의 빈자리를 어떻게 메울지에 대한 우려와 기대가 공존하는 상황입니다.. 인게임 움짤과 유튜브 반응을 정리했습니다..11월 팀 대표가 지속해서 선수 템퍼링 암시 우리는 다른 팀들처럼 템퍼링 안해 템퍼링이라 의심한적 없음, 누가 템퍼링이라고 함. 특히 조마쉬 t1 ceo의 대응이 팬들 사이에서 논란의 중심에 섰다. Com › wangking33 › 223669588899t1 제우스 티원 재계약 불발, 깔끔명료 정리. 현재 t1은 빠르게 도란 선수를 영입하며 새로운 로스터를 꾸리고 있어요. Com › 7842593910티하인드 시크릿랩에 문매님이 의자체험해보라했을때 제우스 롤 리. 이번에 리뷰할 리그오브레전드 롤 신규 스킨은 잠시 후 출시될 t1 제이스 스킨입니다. 현재 t1은 빠르게 도란 선수를 영입하며 새로운 로스터를 꾸리고 있어요. 11월에 ama와 sns로 선수에 과녁만들어서 매장시켜버림 우린 악의가 없었는데 님들이 오해한거임 업계 최고 대우를 해주려고 했다 제우스 배신자 유다, Kr › news › view제우스 최우제, t1 계약 종료에 마지막 인사&mldr. 11월에 ama와 sns로 선수에 과녁만들어서 매장시켜버림 우린 악의가 없었는데 님들이 오해한거임 업계 최고 대우를 해주려고 했다 제우스 배신자 유다.
오늘은 t1 제우스 선수가 사용하는 마우스와 키보드에 대해 알아보았습니다.. Java, solaris는 oracle corporation 및 그 자회사, 관계회사의 등록 상표입니다..
리그 오브 레전드lol 월드 챔피언십롤드컵 우승팀인 t1의 제우스가 팀을 떠나게 된 가운데 팬들의 반응이 엇갈리고 있다, 20일 t1은 공식 소셜미디어를 통해 탑 라이너 제우스가 팀을 떠난다고 밝혔다. 제우스 최우제, t1 계약 종료에 마지막 인사제대로 인사 못.
mib seoyeon seo-101 이번 오프시즌 동안 최우제와의 계약 문제는 팬들 사이에서 가장 큰 화제였는데요. Hpux는 hewlett packard enterprise company의 등록 상표입니다. 제우스 측에서는 에이전시가 있음 t1과 금액적인 부분에서 의견차이가 있었고, 그럼 fa시장에 나와 다른 구단의 평가를 받고싶다 라고 오퍼를 받게 되었어요. 제우스가 막말한 문매니저님은 skt 창단멤버임 jpg. 최고대우라고 구라쳤는데 실상은 대폭 깎았다는 찌라시가. md배고파 이혼
lilanyang 얼굴 스폰서 직원들이 해당 현장에와있고 후기들으려 했는데 무작정 싫고 귀찮다고 아 좀 쉬자고. 즉 t1이 제우스 측의 2년 요구를 받아들이지 않았다는 뜻이 되며, 결국 제우스는 한화생명에 입단하게 되었다. 기자수첩 t1, 제우스, 구마유시, 그리고 조마쉬. 신인이지만 기존의 베테랑 선수들을 능가하는 실력을 보여주는 선수 제우스. T1은 롤드컵 직후부터 전원 잔류를 목표로 협상을 이어왔으나 최우제와는 계약 조건에서 이견을 좁히지 못했다. magenta qwer erome
mib noah101 인게임 움짤과 유튜브 반응을 정리했습니다. 기자수첩 t1, 제우스, 구마유시, 그리고 조마쉬. 리그오브레전드lol e스포츠 게임단 t1의 3연속 월드 챔피언십 결승 진출, 2연속 우승을 이끌었던 제오페구케 선발 라인업이 제우스 최우제의 이탈로 3년만에 막을 내렸다. 기자수첩 t1, 제우스, 구마유시, 그리고 조마쉬. 한눈에 보는 오늘 it과학 뉴스 서울뉴시스 리그 오브 레전드lol롤 e스포츠팀 티원t1은 19일 오후 11시 공식 소셜네트워크서비스sns 채널을 통해 제우스 최우제 계약 종료 소식을 밝혔다. m,issav.ws
madonna missjav 20일 t1은 공식 소셜미디어를 통해 탑 라이너 제우스가 팀을 떠난다고 밝혔다. T1과 탑 라이너 제우스최우제 선수의 결별 이후 여진이 계속되고 있다. T1s official statement and apology regarding the issues with. League of legends esports 팬에게 역대 최고의 리그 명단이 누구인지 묻는다면 대부분은 2024년 t1 명단이라고 대답할 것입니다. League of legends esports 팬에게 역대 최고의 리그 명단이 누구인지 묻는다면 대부분은 2024년 t1 명단이라고 대답할 것입니다.
mayengg03 이번에 리뷰할 리그오브레전드 롤 신규 스킨은 잠시 후 출시될 t1 제이스 스킨입니다. 한눈에 보는 오늘 e스포츠 뉴스 올해 lck 스토브리그 최대 계약으로 꼽히는 제우스 최우제의 한화생명e스포츠로의 이적을 놓고 전 소속팀인 t1과 최우제의 에이전시가 진실 공방을 벌이고 있다. T1에이전시가 역제안도 안하고 이적했고 만약 했으면 40억도 논의 가능했음 억울함. Com › wangking33 › 223669588899t1 제우스 티원 재계약 불발, 깔끔명료 정리. 제우스는 20일 인스타그램에 어제19일는 생각보다 일찍 자유계약선수fa가 발표돼서 제 의도.
Security personnel stand guard during a curfew imposed after protesters clashed with security forces in Imphal, Manipur, India, on August 8, 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 8, 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 8, 2026.
Demonstrators outside Nepal's Parliament during a protest in Kathmandu condemning social media prohibitions and corruption by the government, August 8, 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.
본계정인 t1 zeus 시즌9 최고점수 챌800, 마감티어 그마740점대 까비 시즌10 최고점수 챌1500, 1442., Human Rights Watch’s 36th annual review of human rights practices and trends around the globe, reviews developments in more than 100 countries.