• Somalia: Warring Parties Put Children at Grave Risk
    Feb 21, 2012
    Press release
    Somalia’s warring parties have all failed to protect Somali children from the fighting or serving in their forces, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. The Islamist insurgent group al-Shabaab has increasingly targeted children for recruitment, forced marriage, and rape, and attacked teachers and schools.
  • Philippines: Soldiers on the School Grounds
    Nov 30, 2011
    Press release
    During a recent eight-day investigation in the Cordillera Autonomous Region on northern Luzon island, Human Rights Watch found five cases in which the military, in violation of Philippine and international law, had used parts of functioning schools as barracks or bases for military detachments since 2009. This military use of schools lasted for periods ranging from three months to more than a year.
  • Global: Schools No Havens in War Zones
    Jul 20, 2011
    Press release
    Governments should improve protections for students and teachers during wartime by explicitly outlawing attacks on schools and curtailing their use by the military.
  • Georgia/Abkhazia: Back Home, but in Limbo
    Jul 15, 2011
    Press release
    The rights of ethnic Georgian returnees to Abkhazia are hostage to nearly two decades of political conflict.
  • UN Security Council: Protect Schools, Hospitals in War Zones
    Jul 12, 2011
    Press release
    Armed forces and non-state armed groups should immediately stop targeting schools, teachers and students for attack and comply with new United Nations Security Council measures to protect education in armed conflict, the Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack (GCPEA) said today.
  • Libya: End Indiscriminate Attacks in Western Mountain Towns
    May 9, 2011
    Press release
    Libyan government forces have launched what appear to be repeated indiscriminate attacks on mountain towns in western Libya.
  • Thailand: Southern Insurgents Should Stop Attacking Civilians
    Feb 14, 2011
    Press release
    Separatist insurgents in Thailand's southern border provinces should immediately end attacks on civilians.
  • Pakistan: Balochistan Militants Killing Teachers
    Dec 13, 2010
    Press release
    Militant groups in Pakistan’s Balochistan province should immediately stop killing, threatening, and harassing teachers and other educators. Attacks and bombings by various nationalist, sectarian, and Islamist armed groups have damaged schools and universities, killing and wounding students, and severely harming education in Balochistan.
  • Iran: Escalating Repression of University Students
    Dec 7, 2010
    Press release
    Dozens of university students are behind bars and several hundred others have been expelled from campus because of their political activism or religious affiliation, as Iran marked National Student Day. Many of those in prison hold leadership positions in well known student organizations critical of the government.
  • Thailand: Protect Students, Teachers, Schools in South
    Sep 21, 2010
    Press release
    Separatist attacks on teachers and schools and the government’s use of schools as military bases are greatly harming the education of children in Thailand’s southern border provinces.