Andrew Stroehlein

https://mastodon.social/@andrewstroehlein

Worked over 2 decades with Human Rights Watch & International Crisis Group. Subscribe to my free newsletter, "International Affairs for Normal People": https://www.internationalaffairsfornormalpeople.eu/  Other links: https://linktr.ee/andrewstroehlein

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Last Notes

2026-02-14 09:21:46 UTC

Convincing. A must-read. However, as someone who worked for a long time trying to convince governments to do things they didn't want to do, I'm not sure humanity's leaders will address the issue before it's too late.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/116/068/244/325/054/886/original/4943510230db4aad.png

2026-02-02 08:47:32 UTC

Rough translation: "Too many powerful people are suspects - including my bosses - so, we're not going to investigate. To hell with the victims. To hell with justice."
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/feb/01/epstein-files-todd-blanche-deputy-ag

2026-01-27 14:53:31 UTC

This is honestly the best thing I have read about the US in months. We look from abroad and wonder where the hope is. Read this. Now.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/01/the-neighbors-defending-minnesota-from-ice/685769/?gift=Je3D9AQS-C17lUTOnl2W8L893jn-xkg4gA0ahaD_Ltw&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

2026-01-27 09:52:23 UTC

Sure, let's ask the Trump regime's murderous masked thugs to come over to Europe and "help with security" - wtf?
https://f24.my/BhNO

2026-01-25 14:10:57 UTC

Every American owes a huge debt of gratitude to the brave people in Minnesota who are risking their lives to video the horrific crimes of masked thugs under Trump's vicious regime.
All of us who are not there should be sharing their recorded truth about these crimes and doing whatever we can to see that this reign of terror ends, and the perpetrators are brought to justice.

2026-01-25 08:45:09 UTC

"Across the federal government, officials are advocating for a radical new understanding of the American idea, one rooted not in the vision of the Founders, but in the ideologies of European fascists."
https://www.theatlantic.com/national-security/2026/01/social-media-trump-administration-dhs/685659/?gift=7RPrS0Guk3J6zhX5z2yxiGwtThiR8JfZ-0GNOlmXBbg&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share&fbclid=IwdGRleAPitwxleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAo2NjI4NTY4Mzc5AAEemKgIWjhpXa5zlfIbwgQ0cElxSIJW_s_7fL3RjXhxDdG84dNsjU2s3t19OWQ_aem_t8Ncn9KeOp-CB1Z-B4Y5Rg

2026-01-25 07:45:03 UTC

"The toolbox isn’t particularly varied. President Trump is using all the instruments: the reported quotas for ICE arrests; the paramilitary force made up of thugs drunk on their own brutality; the spectacle of random violence, particularly in city streets; the postmortem vilification of the victims. It’s only natural that our brains struggle to find logic in what we are seeing. There is a logic, and this logic has a name. It’s called state terror."
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/24/opinion/state-terror-has-arrived.html?unlocked_article_code=1.HFA.soDc.3KXo-wEIcKA9&smid=nytcore-android-share&fbclid=IwdGRleAPipf9leHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAo2NjI4NTY4Mzc5AAEem1-Tc9exK--Za22Ov6GezxZa5Bm-uOAi-PtokprtGMdBg3bUKMohxl-_RzY_aem_uEIPXAKLVEP3s33MbtNhyw

2026-01-22 15:02:03 UTC

"Terrible things are happening outside. At any time of night and day, poor helpless people are being dragged out of their homes. ... Families are torn apart; men, women and children are separated. Children come home from school to find that their parents have disappeared."
- Anne Frank, The Diary of a Young Girl

2026-01-21 10:17:40 UTC

Corruption is integral to authoritarian rule.
https://f24.my/BgWI

2026-01-19 11:18:05 UTC

“Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace...”
The guy is clearly deranged. Time to use the 25th Ammendment to save the country and the world from his madness.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/19/donald-trump-greenland-threats-nobel-prize-snub-letter

2026-01-18 14:32:42 UTC

Appeasement didn't work with Hitler.
Appeasement didn't work with Putin.
Appeasement isn't working with Trump.
When will Europe learn this most basic lesson about how to deal with imperialist bullies?
https://www.politico.eu/article/hit-back-donald-trump-europe-mulls-unthinkable-options-greenland-threats-ramp-up-tensions/

2026-01-17 16:30:31 UTC

"...the vast majority of men are only willing to engage in public violence if they feel like the people around them will approve of — and reward them for — that violence.
ICE Watch works because it surrounds men seeking approval with people loudly expressing their disapproval. ...
In Minneapolis ... There are countless videos from ICE Watch observers that show agents leaving without detaining anyone after they encounter resistance."
https://www.ms.now/opinion/minneapolis-ice-watch-protesters-violence-research

2026-01-16 14:10:38 UTC

"If everyone would just stay out of the Gestapo's way and let them do their job, no one would get hurt."
- Someone in Germany, 1930s

2026-01-16 13:23:03 UTC

It's revealing how Trump regime officials and their oligarch supporters always claim demonstrators against them and the regime's crimes are somehow paid to protest. They simply cannot imagine anyone doing something not for money but for principle, to uphold human decency or defend the law. Their power-addled, only-money-matters brains are incapable of even conceiving a moral purpose.

2026-01-16 09:32:36 UTC

Knut Hamsun, a Norwegian writer, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1920.
In 1943, he sent Joseph Goebbels (Hitler's propaganda minister) his Nobel Prize medal as a gift.

2026-01-14 07:22:56 UTC

The Trump regime demanding lists of Jews.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/13/upenn-trump-jews-list

2026-01-13 20:43:26 UTC

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Result.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/115/889/728/189/614/822/original/a6af2d336a26fa38.png

2026-01-13 12:25:56 UTC

I wrote this a few years from now…
https://www.internationalaffairsfornormalpeople.eu/why-the-us-collapsed/

2026-01-10 14:52:24 UTC

How is it that US security forces can go to an enemy country and kidnap its president and his wife alive, and yet they can't handle a gentle mom in an SUV without murdering her?

2026-01-10 08:03:08 UTC

When did you stop posting on X?
Person A: When its owner made nazi salutes.
Person B: When it became a production and distribution channel for images of child sexual abuse.
Government: We're still posting there.

2026-01-08 17:26:41 UTC

Even if the regime doesn't cover up this murder, and even if the thug is found guilty - two enormous ifs - Trump will pardon him and treat him as a hero in the Oval Office.
I'm pretty sure Trump's masked thugs know this & it's why they act with such violence. They know they will get away with it.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/08/minneapolis-school-class-canceled-ice-killed-woman

2026-01-07 20:40:24 UTC

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Done.

2026-01-07 10:29:29 UTC

"Why is the government posting on a deepfake child porn site?"
That's the question to ask them, journalist friends.

2026-01-06 09:11:25 UTC

After the Trump regime attacks Greenland and destroys NATO, how long will it take the Putin regime to stop celebrating and launch an invasion of Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, and/or Poland?
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jan/05/trump-must-give-up-fantasies-about-annexation-says-greenland-pm

2026-01-05 14:44:47 UTC

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...
This is authoritarianism, plain and simple.

2026-01-05 14:44:21 UTC

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...
The Trump regime's mass assault on immigrants and sending people to be tortured is not done to divert attention from the Trump regime's unprecedented corruption, its promoting extremist parties in Europe, its boosting Putin, or its wrecking NATO.
All this illegality and horror is done completely in the open - no diversions - and for completely open reasons: the Trump regime has zero respect for the law, it is grabbing as much power as it can, and no one is stopping it.
...

2026-01-05 14:42:46 UTC

The Trump regime's attack on Venezuela for its oil is not done to divert attention from the Trump regime's refusal to release the Epstein files.
The Trump regime's refusal to release the Epstein files is not done to divert attention from the Trump regime's mass assault on immigrants and sending people to be tortured.
...

2026-01-03 09:06:53 UTC

Using US taxpayer dollars to bomb people and steal another country’s oil for oligarchs to sell to US taxpayers. Taxpayers pay twice, the rich get richer, and climate change from burning fossil fuels gets worse, spreading disasters globally. Murder, corruption, theft, terrorism, climate destruction - all in one.

2025-12-26 07:33:51 UTC

"In his 1941 book, Escape from Freedom, the German psychoanalyst Erich Fromm argued that the rise of fascism could be explained in part by people preferring to surrender their freedom in exchange for the reassuring certainty of subordination. AI offers a new way of surrendering that burden of having to think and decide for yourself."
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/dec/26/ai-dark-ages-enlightenment

2025-12-24 13:22:00 UTC

"Only the bullies & petty fascists of the Trump administration could miss the irony of decrying 'speech suppression' while using state power to silence critics engaging in protected speech."
Indeed. The Trump regime is in a haze, drunk on abusing power.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2025/dec/24/free-speech-tech-us-relations-ed-davey-keir-starmer-uk-politics-live-news-updates?CMP=share_btn_url&page=with%3Ablock-694bdd848f08892a3e2ae4e6#block-694bdd848f08892a3e2ae4e6

2025-12-18 20:40:10 UTC

Right or left, right or wrong, whatever you thought of the USA over the past few decades, you surely thought it was at least a serious country with a serious government. That’s all gone now. And all the wolves waiting in the wings see that clearly, too.

2025-12-14 08:24:12 UTC

"I kept thinking about all the extremist voices promoting hate & division. They are being given so many platforms, while voices that represent kindness, open mindedness & empathy seem to be scarcer & scarcer. I felt I couldn’t pamper myself with the luxury of silence.”
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/dec/13/comedian-robin-ince-quits-as-host-of-bbcs-infinite-monkey-cage

2025-12-13 13:16:05 UTC

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“For every inch yielded, there’s going to be another inch demanded. Where does it stop?”
- Michael O’Flaherty, the Council of Europe’s commissioner for human rights.
Exactly.
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2025/dec/13/europe-echr-rethink-moral-retreat-say-human-rights-experts

2025-12-12 11:54:16 UTC

Some worry this might set a precedent.
I hope it does.
Every regime that invades another country, committing countless mass atrocities, should have their foreign assets taken & handed to their victims.
This might get all would-be invaders to think twice.
https://www.euractiv.com/news/eu-greenlights-indefinite-immobilisation-of-russian-assets/

2025-12-11 17:22:14 UTC

Every article about Musk in every media outlet should be accompanied by this photo.
He did this twice at the biggest political event of 2025. It's not a secret. He never apologized. Why is this not the standard file photo?
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/115/702/084/474/446/224/original/8d3634db70f64ac6.jpg

2025-12-10 13:23:51 UTC

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Where is the leadership? Rather than copying racist, attention-seeking buffoons, how about doing what leaders should be doing and providing your own vision?

2025-12-10 13:22:57 UTC

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Adopting far-right policies to stop the far right gaining influence - continues to be the stupidest idea in European politics today.
You cannot "out far right" the far right. If you adopt one policy they want, they will always have more (and darker) policies to push. So, what then? You just keep following them down the path towards more human rights abuses and eventually atrocity crimes?
And how long will it take voters to figure out you're just a cheap copy and then vote for the original?

2025-12-10 13:20:21 UTC

If our government makes Jews wear yellow stars now, that upstart Hitler fellow won't stand a chance in the next election. 🙄
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2025/dec/09/starmer-urges-europe-leaders-update-echr-halt-rise-far-right

2025-12-10 13:07:24 UTC

"...the current US government believes that its national security is best served by the destruction of liberal democracy in Europe. In other words, the US is not (just) an unwilling ally, it is a willing adversary. Time to act accordingly."
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/dec/10/trump-security-strategy-europe-liberal-democracy

2025-12-06 13:13:32 UTC

"They have been taken into custody."
Not, "custardy"?
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/dec/06/tower-of-london-closes-apple-crumble-thrown-on-crown-jewels-display-case

2025-11-28 18:19:36 UTC

If a mass murderer attacks you for exposing his atrocities, you must be doing something right.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2025/11/28/russia-government-designates-human-rights-watch-undesirable

2025-11-20 19:35:17 UTC

Symbols of the two regimes that killed the most Americans - now embraced by the Trump regime.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2025/11/20/coast-guard-swastika-noose/

2025-11-17 08:28:49 UTC

Desperate people forced to risk their lives to escape war and persecution - let's rob them of all they've got left!
This is the sick thinking of human traffickers, not decent governments.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/115/564/091/014/494/850/original/ecee88c3e7ca4033.png

2025-11-11 18:31:42 UTC

So, just to be clear, the US political system is now essentially one fascist-promoting party, one fascist-appeasement party, and a few individual outliers, people who are called nasty names for suggesting policies every other industrialized country has had for decades. Meanwhile, masked thugs keep kidnapping people off the streets.
Such a waste of a potentially decent country.

2025-11-07 19:02:57 UTC

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I responded as an alum, in this email to them.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/115/509/960/259/405/863/original/f59cbb3c22e1f807.png

2025-11-07 18:25:07 UTC

How Cornell University gave in to the Trump regime's extortion... Here's the "agreement":
https://statements.cornell.edu/2025/documents/cornell-settlement-agreement.pdf

2025-11-04 17:40:19 UTC

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Joe has just been sentenced to 10 years forced labour. Outrageous.
https://www.lalibre.be/dernieres-depeches/2025/11/04/centrafrique-un-consultant-belgo-portugais-dune-ong-condamne-a-10-ans-de-travaux-forces-NEURDJOAFNFJFJI7N2IWXMU4JU/

2025-11-04 15:59:00 UTC

He should have been prosecuted for torture.
https://www.hrw.org/report/2015/12/01/no-more-excuses/roadmap-justice-cia-torture
Another ugly criminal escapes justice.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/04/dick-cheney-vice-president-republican-bush-dies

2025-10-27 07:23:54 UTC

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#LetJoeGo
Petition: https://petitions.protecthumanitarians.org/en/petitions/1-free-joseph-figueira-martin-humanitarian-arbitrarily-detained-and-tortured-in-the-central-african-republic
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/115/444/921/905/924/521/original/5327f9a975154135.jpeg

2025-10-24 18:24:39 UTC

"History has already shown us how this story unfolds. Fascism is not built only in the camps and cells. It is built in the shrug, the silence, the insistence that life can go on as if nothing has changed."
https://frederickjoseph.substack.com/p/normal-times-in-dire-times

2025-10-23 18:00:39 UTC

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If you were working overseas, and you were suddenly arrested, tortured, and left to rot in prison, what would you think your own country’s government would do for you? Would they help?

2025-10-23 12:25:27 UTC

Arrested and tortured by Russian forces in the Central African Republic, humanitarian researcher Joseph Figueira Martin has been imprisoned in inhuman conditions for more than 500 days. Finally, authorities have given him a trial date: Tuesday, 28 October. Hopefully, Joe’s nightmare will end soon.
https://www.internationalaffairsfornormalpeople.eu/hope-for-joe/

2025-10-21 20:30:54 UTC

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It's pretty pathetic really. You become the most powerful person on the planet, and all you can think about doing is making a few bucks.

2025-10-21 20:24:37 UTC

When people call it fascism, it's almost giving Trump too much credit. It's just a looting spree. All the ideological moves - the murders at sea, the masked goons arresting folks in the streets, the collapse of rule of law - are just cover so he can steal as much of taxpayers' money as possible.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/21/us/politics/trump-justice-department-compensation.html

2025-10-21 15:39:10 UTC

"Trump wanted to mock and smear millions of Americans, literally depicting them covered in excrement, precisely so that none of his own supporters would want to join them."
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/10/trump-no-kings-day-protest-ai-poop/684621/

2025-10-17 10:15:05 UTC

Over the past six weeks, the US has bombed boats in the Caribbean Sea at least six times, killing at least 27 people. Washington says they were “narcoterrorists” and so… And so, what exactly? If the government declares you a criminal, they can then just kill you?
The latest edition of my newsletter looks at Trump's Marine Murders: https://www.internationalaffairsfornormalpeople.eu/trumps-marine-murders/

2025-10-16 15:02:55 UTC

You can call these "extrajudicial killings" - the Trump regime acting as executioner without any trials for the accused.
Or you can put it simply: this is murder. Multiple murders.
And the regime doesn't even seem to know who they are murdering.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/oct/16/airstrike-venezuela-trinidad-us-death-investigation

2025-10-14 20:01:06 UTC

I know people who were raised in a Christian atmosphere and now loudly proclaim to be Christians, who have zero compassion for others.
I also know people who were raised in a Christian atmosphere but are now atheists, who have dedicated their lives to helping others.
So, who absorbed the message, and who didn't?

2025-10-11 08:12:53 UTC

Meet the man tapped to be the Czech Republic's next Foreign Minister, Filip Turek. He has repeatedly endorsed Hitler and belittled the Holocaust. His string of racist vulgarities includes calling Obama the n-word. His sexist ugliness includes rejecting women's suffrage.
Will the country seriously embarrass itself internationally by having this hateful idiot as a minister?
https://denikn.cz/1864721/popalit-cikane-je-polehcujici-okolnost-obama-je-negr-odhalujeme-smazany-svet-filipa-turka/

2025-10-07 05:43:59 UTC

The foundation of authoritarian rule is lies.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/oct/06/oregon-republicans-protest-photo-south-america

2025-10-01 12:43:38 UTC

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The general idea also fails to recognize that authoritarian regimes are not simply one man. They are entire systems with many people having an interest in keeping that system going.
Trump could walk away tomorrow, and the descent of the US into authoritarian rule would not suddenly stop.

2025-10-01 12:43:13 UTC

Good piece. Worth reading.
Still, I sometimes think speculation about Trump's health is often tinged with hope this could send him packing. Wild hopes, I fear, and something I saw in authoritarian regimes over the years - like it would be a magic key to the exit door.
https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2025/09/trump-hegseth-speech-incoherent/684421/

2025-10-01 06:41:15 UTC

It's hard for some of my fellow Europeans to understand why Trump is sending the military to US cities.
It's hard for me to understand why some of my fellow Europeans support Trump wannabes in the EU & UK.
Politics based on imagined threats of internal enemies always heads in this direction: toward state violence against innocent people.
How can anyone look at the descent of the US into authoritarian mass violence & think, "yeah, that's what my country needs, too?"
https://www-bbc-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvgq044n72po.amp

2025-09-28 19:38:40 UTC

I'm fairly sure that most US politicians who say [whatever US city] is a "war zone" have never been to an actual war zone.

2025-09-26 06:44:24 UTC

Read this. Seriously, read it.
The Trump regime is declaring open season on its critics - NGOs, philanthropists, activists. They will be harassed, arrested, jailed. The silencing effect on others who might speak out will be huge.
This is authoritarianism.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/09/enforcing-the-death-penalty-laws-in-the-district-of-columbia-to-deter-and-punish-the-most-heinous-crimes/

2025-09-25 12:08:25 UTC

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... Looking forward, I’m now searching for new work. If you know anyone looking for someone with more than two decades of senior-level experience in international NGO communications, let me know.
I also have a little personal project I’m working on – stay tuned…
Andrew

2025-09-25 12:08:06 UTC

Some personal news. Along with a number of other colleagues, I was laid off by Human Rights Watch for budget reasons in July.
Looking back, I’m proud of what I helped the HRW team achieve in the more than 12 years I worked there. There are still many smart, dedicated people at HRW, working in the toughest global context for human rights we’ve seen in a very long time. They continue to have my support, and they deserve yours.
...

2025-09-25 11:32:55 UTC

Whatever the merits of the arguments, the threat seems empty - along the lines of, "I'll hit myself in the head with this hammer if you don't do what I want"
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/sep/25/apple-calls-for-changes-to-anti-monopoly-laws-and-says-it-may-stop-shipping-to-the-eu

2025-09-18 18:06:34 UTC

From 1939: https://www.nytimes.com/1939/02/04/archives/goebbels-ends-careers-of-five-aryan-actors-who-made-witticisms.html
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/115/226/620/941/592/483/original/a6ccbe6fe7b21c32.png

2025-09-18 08:52:48 UTC

There is no organization called "antifa" - so, why label a non-existent group "terrorists"?
This gives the regime maximum scope to hunt down opposition and critics. They label you "antifa", and then they come for you.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/sep/17/trump-antifa-terrorist-organization

2025-09-15 20:19:14 UTC

It's definitely not an authoritarian regime trying to silence dissent. No, certainly nothing like that. All comparisons to Nazi Germany are completely absurd.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/15/us/politics/jd-vance-charlie-kirk-show.html?smid=url-share

2025-09-13 19:41:17 UTC

To understand how ignorant the anti-foreigner folks are, consider this photo from the hate march in London today.
That's the flag of Georgia they're waving.
Georgia. A foreign country.
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/115/198/683/276/145/127/original/c70a567ee720259b.png

2025-09-13 16:43:31 UTC

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The biggest trap is following the US down the path of self-destruction by self-distraction - that is, spending far too much time and attention on things that are not problems at all, while real problems are downgraded or their solutions delayed.

2025-09-13 16:42:39 UTC

The only good thing about the ongoing disintegration of the US is that it's been happening slowly enough for other countries to adjust economically and politically.
The question is whether Europe, for example, has been making good use of this time or squandering the opportunity by falling into the same disintegrative traps as the US.

2025-08-16 06:14:32 UTC

The deal: Trump gives Putin a photo op, Putin gives Trump a photo op. Putin's mass murder in Ukraine continues. Trump's unparalleled incompetence in diplomacy continues.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/15/trump-putin-alaska-meeting-ukraine

2025-07-28 12:09:11 UTC

"Two leading human rights organisations based in Israel, B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights, say Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in #Gaza and the country’s western allies have a legal and moral duty to stop it."
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jul/28/israel-committing-genocide-in-gaza-say-israel-based-human-rights-groups

2025-07-14 07:40:35 UTC

"It is a concentration camp."
- Israel’s former prime minister Ehud Olmert
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jul/13/israel-humanitarian-city-rafah-gaza-camp-ehud-olmert

2025-07-07 06:38:34 UTC

The Xi Jinping government has sought to eradicate the influence of lawyers who defend people’s rights while compelling the rest of the legal profession to serve the Chinese Communist Party’s political agenda. https://www.hrw.org/news/2025/07/06/china-10-years-since-709-crackdown-lawyers-still-under-fire

2025-06-16 05:42:48 UTC

#Hungary’s withdrawal from the International Criminal Court is an insult to victims and survivors of the world’s worst crimes.
“After refusing to arrest Netanyahu, an ICC fugitive, when he visited the country, Hungary is now doubling down on impunity...”
https://www.hrw.org/news/2025/06/16/hungary-orban-government-withdraws-from-icc

2025-06-11 11:40:39 UTC

I know everyone is overwhelmed with multiple crises around the world right now, but please take 3 minutes to remind yourself of what may be the worst of them all - but probably gets the least international attention: #Sudan.
https://www.hrw.org/the-day-in-human-rights/2025/06/11?story=paragraph-10969

2025-06-10 14:57:59 UTC

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Fellow Europeans who look on in horror at what Trump is trying to do in the US should know that the EU has essentially been doing this for years: helping to return people to places where they know they'll likely be tortured: https://www.hrw.org/the-day-in-human-rights/2025/05/12?story=paragraph-10777

2025-06-10 14:53:34 UTC

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Governments are not allowed to torture people or send people to another country where they might be tortured.
That's the law.
It's also basic human decency.

2025-06-10 14:40:13 UTC

No.
https://www.vox.com/scotus/416163/trump-supreme-court-deport-immigration-convention-torture

2025-06-08 10:32:53 UTC

Probably the most dangerous thing in politics is when a leader needs conflict - when he depends on conflict for his political power, maybe knows no other way to hold on to power. Driving up fears of others, launching deliberate provocations to incite violence, to then expand conflict, all for his own power, with not a thought about the death and destruction others face because of his lust for power.

2025-06-06 15:45:16 UTC

Israel's "calibrated starvation as policy" in #Gaza
https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north-africa/east-mediterranean-mena/israelpalestine/gaza-starvation-experiment

2025-06-06 09:06:27 UTC

What I'm trying to do with this Daily Brief is write about human rights in ways that we can all understand.
It's not intended for experts and activists (although, many of them have told me they like it, too).
Have a look at recent editions and tell me what you think:
https://www.hrw.org/daily-brief-archive
https://files.mastodon.social/media_attachments/files/114/635/619/769/928/127/original/9dafc0054219f3f3.png

2025-06-04 07:26:40 UTC

US military strikes on the Ras Issa Port in Hodeidah, Yemen, on April 17, caused dozens of civilian casualties and significant damage to port infrastructure. The port is a critical entry point for aid in #Yemen and hundreds of workers were present.
The attack showed a callous disregard for civilians’ lives and should be investigated as a war crime.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2025/06/04/yemen-us-strikes-port-apparent-war-crime

2025-05-30 10:18:14 UTC

“It would have been easy for Musk to take his private plane to a country like Uganda to see for himself the work U.S.A.I.D. has done providing medicine to people with H.I.V. or feeding refugees from South Sudan. Instead, he drew on the counsel of internet trolls and staffed DOGE with lackeys who were similarly ignorant.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/30/opinion/elon-musk-doge-usaid.html

2025-05-29 05:42:08 UTC

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"...segregation of Roma children constitutes a longstanding violation of the race equality directive & the EU charter of fundamental rights. European Commission targets of reducing segregation of Roma in primary schools by only 50% by 2030 ... give a free pass to segregationists across the bloc"

2025-05-29 05:38:09 UTC

"...racial segregation in schools exists today in several countries in the EU. In #Slovakia, more than 60% of Roma children attend schools where they are in the majority."
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/may/29/segregated-classrooms-roma-slovakia

2025-05-28 04:24:18 UTC

On May 29, the city of Aachen plans to honor European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen with the prestigious Karlspreis award, partly for the “impetus she has given to the Green Deal”.
Weird when von der Leyen is in fact dismantling one of the Green Deal’s most meaningful achievements.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2025/05/28/eu-commission-president-receives-award-green-deal-laws-she-undoing

2025-05-26 06:17:07 UTC

EU tells Hungary to scrap its anti-NGO bill or face court (EU Observer): https://euobserver.com/rule-of-law/ar67861009?utm_source=EUobserver+Newsletter&utm_campaign=f0eab39c55-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2025_05_26_05_23&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_8f318ca8da-f0eab39c55-115059713
Background: https://www.hrw.org/the-day-in-human-rights/2025/05/21?story=paragraph-10830

2025-05-22 12:37:23 UTC

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Has anyone in the #EPP ever said sorry for supporting Orbán & Fidesz for years and years as they drove #Hungary into its authoritarian hole? Even just one word of reflection on that catastrophic error the EU keeps paying for every day today?

2025-05-22 12:23:28 UTC

Transitions published this piece from me on #Hungary and I love the photo and photo credit they used…
https://tol.org/client/article/how-to-gut-democracy.html

2025-05-22 05:51:19 UTC

If anyone ever needs a step-by-step guide to destroying democracy, just see what Viktor Orbán and his government have been doing in #Hungary.
https://www.hrw.org/the-day-in-human-rights/2025/05/21?story=paragraph-10830

2025-05-19 15:40:57 UTC

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"This designation is nothing more than an attempt by authorities to intimidate and deter Russian citizens from supporting or cooperating with this prominent, deeply respected organisation." - Rachel Denber, Human Rights Watch
https://news.sky.com/story/russia-bans-amnesty-international-as-an-undesirable-organisation-13370917

2025-05-19 12:21:34 UTC

Yet again, Russia is aiming to hide the truth about human rights violations in Russia and Russia's atrocities in Ukraine.
https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/05/19/russia-declares-amnesty-international-undesirable-a89127

2025-05-19 05:10:38 UTC

This is very good - not just because it confirms what I’ve come to believe after decades in the public debate business, but yes, also that
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/may/18/change-mind-evidence-arguing-social-relationships

2025-05-15 14:05:34 UTC

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Israel’s blockade on #Gaza is a tool of extermination.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2025/05/15/gaza-latest-israeli-plan-inches-closer-extermination

2025-05-15 12:29:49 UTC

Today, everyone knows what’s happening in #Gaza. Israel has been committing atrocities - war crimes, crimes against humanity, acts of genocide… The new plan makes Israel's intentions even more obvious.
Other countries have obligations that are just as obvious… https://www.hrw.org/the-day-in-human-rights/2025/05/15?story=paragraph-10790