Human Rights Watch News

Tajikistan: EU States, Turkey Should Not Return Dissidents

Human Rights Watch — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 21:00:01 -0400

Click to expand Image Groups protest against the visit of Tajikistan President Emomali Rahmon and other Central Asian leaders to Berlin, Germany, September 29, 2023. © 2023 snapshot-photography/FBoillot/Shutterstock

(Berlin, April 16, 2024) – Several people based in Lithuania, Poland, and Turkey, linked to a banned Tajik opposition movement, Group 24, have in recent months disappeared or have been arrested and threatened with extradition to Tajikistan, Human Rights Watch and the Norwegian Helsinki Committee said today.

Group 24 is a political movement promoting democratic reforms in Tajikistan, which the Tajik government banned and designated a terrorist organization in October 2014. Tajikistan has for the last decade sought the extradition of exiled activists in other countries, some of whom also have been killed or forcibly disappeared. Host governments should not deport the people concerned to Tajikistan because of the risk of torture and should respect Tajik asylum seekers’ full due process rights, including not arbitrarily detaining them at the behest of unfounded and politically motivated requests by the Tajik government.

“Tajikistan should unequivocally end its decade-long hunt of perceived critics abroad, especially those related to Group 24 and other banned groups,” said Syinat Sultanalieva, Central Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The EU and Turkey should protect opposition activists and refrain from returning them to Tajikistan, a country known for engaging in transnational repression, where they risk being tortured.”

Human Rights Watch recently published a report on transnational repression – targeting of critics abroad by repressive governments – that includes several cases of members of Group 24, both former and active, who had fled the country only to be targeted by the Tajik government, seeking their arrest and extradition to Tajikistan on charges of terrorism or extremism-related activities. Activists in exile have also been subject to enforced disappearances or abusive use of Interpol Red Notices, which is a request to law enforcement worldwide to locate and provisionally arrest a person because a government is seeking their extradition.

On April 5, 2024, Lithuanian security services detained Sulaimon Davlatov, a former member of Group 24, in Vilnius on charges of allegedly violating Lithuania’s national security. On April 7, a court in Vilnius ordered his pretrial detention for two months, and on April 9 the Lithuanian Prosecutor General’s office told the media that Davlatov “presents a threat to the national security of Lithuania due to his cooperation with members and allies of terrorist organizations, extremist movements and propaganda of extremism.”

Davlatov has been a resident of Lithuania since he was granted asylum in 2015. Lithuanian authorities should rule out any risk that Davlatov could be extradited to Tajikistan, and in line with fair trial rights, grant Davlatov and his lawyer immediate access to any evidence they have to substantiate the allegations.

On February 23 and March 10 respectively, two senior figures in Group 24, Nasimjon Sharifov and Sukhrob Zafar, disappeared in Turkey. Both had previously been detained by the Turkish police in March 2018 at the request of Tajik authorities and threatened with extradition but were eventually released. They had recently told family and colleagues that they were receiving regular threats from Tajik intelligence services. Neither man’s whereabouts is currently known. Friends and colleagues are concerned that they may have been forcibly disappeared by either or both Tajik and Turkish authorities and extrajudicially removed to Tajikistan.

On March 19, a court in Poland ordered Komron Khudoydodov, brother of former Group 24 activist Shabnam Khudoydodova, to leave Poland by April 19 voluntarily or be deported to Tajikistan. This followed the rejection of his application for asylum. Khudoydodov moved to Poland in 2018 on a humanitarian visa from the Polish authorities granted because he faced persecution in Tajikistan due to his sister’s peaceful political activity. In 2015, Tajik authorities had Shabnam Khudoydodova placed on the Interpol Red Notices on charges of extremism.

Tajik authorities also have an ongoing criminal investigation against Komron Khudoydodov on charges of extremism. Returning Khudoydodov to Tajikistan would place him at risk of torture or ill-treatment, and therefore be a violation of the ban on refoulement. Poland should make clear that it will abide by its international legal obligations and rule out deporting Khudoydodov to Tajikistan.

In addition to Lithuania and Poland, other European Union members, such as Austria, Germany, and Slovakia, have in recent years returned or threatened to return Tajik asylum seekers to Tajikistan despite credible evidence of their risk of being tortured. Upon their arrival in Tajikistan, those deported from the EU member states have been jailed.

The United Nations Convention against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, prohibits the expulsion, return (refoulment), or extradition of a person to another state where there are substantial grounds for believing that they would be in danger of being tortured. The European Convention on Human Rights also incorporates this ban as an element of the prohibition on torture and inhuman and degrading treatment. All EU member countries and Turkey are party to both treaties. This principle is also incorporated into Lithuanian, Polish, and Turkish domestic law.

“EU member states and Turkey should uphold their international human rights obligations, including not to return people at risk of torture and persecution for their political activism to their country of origin,” Sultanalieva said. “They should denounce cases of transnational repression and review any cooperation agreements with states engaged in targeting critics abroad.”

Saudi Arabia: Free Award-Winning Activist

Human Rights Watch — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 06:00:00 -0400

Click to expand Image Waleed Abu al-Khair, prominent lawyer and human rights activist, speaks to Human Rights Watch over Skype from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia on September 19, 2013. © 2013 Human Rights Watch

(Beirut) – Saudi authorities should immediately release Waleed Abu al-Khair, an award-winning Saudi human rights defender and lawyer, 17 human rights groups including Human Rights Watch said today, on the 10th anniversary of his arrest. He is serving a 15-year prison sentence due to his peaceful human rights activism.

“This grim anniversary of Waleed Abu al-Khair’s arrest undermines Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s hollow narrative of reform,” said Joey Shea, Saudi Arabia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Waleed Abu al-Khair, along with many other of Saudi Arabia’s best and brightest citizens, remains unjustly locked up for nothing more than demanding a rights-respecting future for their country.”

The Specialized Criminal Court (SCC), Saudi Arabia’s terrorism tribunal, convicted Abu al-Khair in July 2014 primarily for his comments to media outlets and tweets criticizing Saudi Arabia’s human rights record, especially the country’s harsh sentences against peaceful critics. The court also issued a 15-year travel ban and imposed a fine of 200,000 Saudi riyals (about US$53,000).

Abu al-Khair won the prestigious Human Rights Award from the Law Society of Upper Canada in 2016. He has won numerous other human rights awards as well.

“Abu al-Khair has lost 10 years of his life to the Saudi government’s repression,” Shea said. “The Saudi authorities should release him immediately.”

Justa Libertad: A Movement to Decriminalize Abortion in Ecuador

Human Rights Watch — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 06:00:00 -0400

Click to expand Image Women from different organizations that are part of the Justa Libertad movement raise green scarves outside the Constitutional Court of Ecuador in Quito, March 19, 2024. © 2024 Karen Toro

Justa Libertad, an Ecuadorian coalition of eight civil society organizations, recently filed a lawsuit before the Constitutional Court of Ecuador seeking to decriminalize abortion. This crucial initiative seeks to ensure that women, girls, and other pregnant people can access safe abortion care. It follows similar coalitions that achieved progress in other Latin American countries like Colombia, Mexico, and Argentina.

Abortion is currently penalized in Ecuador with up to three years in prison, with exceptions for cases in which the pregnancy represents a risk to the life or health of the pregnant woman or, after a 2021 Constitutional Court ruling, when the pregnancy is the result of sexual violence. Even for cases that fit these narrow exceptions, accessing abortion care remains challenging due to stigma among health personnel and other institutions that hold the belief that once pregnant, women and girls are obligated to become mothers.

Justa Libertad embodies the struggle for social justice and women’s rights in Ecuador. The denial of abortion services can violate a number of human rights, including the rights to nondiscrimination and equality; life; health; information; freedom from torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment; privacy and bodily autonomy and integrity; and freedom of conscience and religion. Women, girls, and other pregnant people have the right to make decisions about their own body and their future.

Regulating abortion via criminal law perpetuates its stigma and disproportionately affects women and girls living in conditions of poverty, including Indigenous and Afro-descendant people.

Amid a movement across Latin America to achieve reproductive justice, decriminalizing abortion is an urgent matter. Ecuador should join other countries in taking this step.

Germany: Scholz Should Stand Firm on Rights in China

Human Rights Watch — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 01:00:00 -0400

(Berlin) – German Chancellor Olaf Scholz should stress the importance of human rights in the Sino-German relationship during his visit to China and meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Human Rights Watch said today. Scholz arrived in Beijing on April 13, 2024, and is expected to meet with Xi on April 16.

“Chancellor Scholz should not play second fiddle to Germany’s narrow business interests, but should lead by setting the Sino-German relationship on a rights-respecting footing,” said Wenzel Michalski, Germany director at Human Rights Watch. “Promoting human rights is good both for the Chinese people and for Germany’s long-term interests.”

Scholz last visited Beijing in November 2022, when he also brought along a large business delegation. Since then, Germany has issued a new China strategy in which it commits to responding to an increasingly assertive and abusive Chinese government by “de-risking," or reducing reliance on China for critical supply chains. The strategy also asserts that “[h]uman rights are at the heart of” German government policies toward China.

In an April 12 letter to the German chancellor, Human Rights Watch urged Scholz to make clear to Xi that the Sino-German relationship will suffer if Beijing does not address serious human rights violations in China. These include ending its crimes against humanity targeting Uyghurs and other Turkic communities in Xinjiang and freeing the hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs arbitrarily detained or imprisoned, including Rahile Dawut, a prominent expert on ethnography, and Ilham Tohti, Uyghur scholar and Sakharov Prize laureate.

Beijing should also revoke the two draconian national security laws in Hong Kong and release those wrongfully detained in mainland China, including human rights lawyer Yu Wensheng and his wife, Xu Yan.

In a 2022 public opinion poll in Germany, 68 percent of those who responded said that is it important for Germany to stand up for human rights when dealing with China.

“Scholz needs to put Germany’s China strategy into action by forthrightly putting human rights at the center of the Sino-German relationship,” Michalski said. “The German government should demonstrate its commitment by impressing upon Chinese leaders its principled and public support for the human rights of everyone in China.”

Abu Ghraib Torture Case Finally Goes to Trial

Human Rights Watch — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 00:01:00 -0400

Twenty years have passed since the media broke the story that US forces and the CIA were torturing “war on terror” detainees at Abu Ghraib and other US-run prisons in Iraq. But for the men who were tortured, it feels like only yesterday. The physical and mental scars they carry serve as daily reminders of the abuse they suffered.

Still, several of these men told me they hold out hope that the US government will apologize and give them the redress they deserve.

On April 15, a federal court in Virginia will hear the case of Al Shimari et al. v. CACI, a lawsuit brought by the US-based Center for Constitutional Rights on behalf of three Iraqi torture victims. The suit asserts that CACI, a private security company which the US government hired in 2003 to interrogate prisoners in Iraq, directed and participated in torture and other abuse at Abu Ghraib. The men are seeking compensatory and punitive damages.

CACI has tried to have the case dismissed 20 times since it was first filed in 2008.

Al Shimari et al. v. CACI was only able to advance because it targeted a military contractor. US courts have repeatedly dismissed similar cases against the federal government because of a 1946 law that preserves US forces’ immunity for claims that arise during war.

What’s more, the US government hasn’t created any official compensation program or other avenues for redress for those who allege they were tortured or abused. Nor are there any pathways available to have their cases heard.

This lawsuit is a critical step towards justice for these three men who will finally have their day in court. But they are the lucky few. For the hundreds of other survivors still suffering from past abuses, their chances of justice remain slim. The US Government should do the right thing: take responsibility for their abuses, offer an apology, and open an avenue to redress that has been denied them for too many years.

Brazil: Reject Bill That Entrenches Failed Drug Policy

Human Rights Watch — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 00:00:01 -0400

(São Paulo) – Brazil’s Congress should reject a proposed constitutional amendment that would entrench the criminalization of drug possession for personal use.

The Senate is expected to vote in the coming days on an amendment to article 5 of Brazil’s Constitution, which guarantees the right to privacy, that would restrict that right by criminalizing the possession of illegal drugs regardless of quantity. If approved, the proposed amendment would be put to a second vote at the full Senate and then go to the Chamber of Deputies.

“Decades of drug policy failure in Brazil should make clear that criminal law is simply ineffective to address the harmful use of drugs and leads to serious human rights abuses,” said Andrea Carvalho, Brazil researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Instead of cementing a failed policy in the constitution, lawmakers should follow the example of many other countries by decriminalizing the possession of drugs for personal use and developing effective health strategies to prevent and respond to problematic substance use.”

Current law already criminalizes drug possession for personal use, but introducing this language in the constitution would make it much harder to pursue much-needed drug policy reforms in Brazil, Human Rights Watch said.

The president of the Senate, Rodrigo Pacheco, has made clear that the constitutional amendment is a pre-emptive attempt by lawmakers to counter an upcoming Supreme Court decision that could improve drug policy, Human Rights Watch said. Pacheco introduced the proposal on September 14, 2023, a few weeks after the Supreme Court resumed its review of a case that will decide whether current Brazilian law violates the Constitution. Upon introducing the bill, Pacheco stressed that it is Congress that “defines the laws in the country” and other branches of government should recognize that authority.

In March 2024, after the Supreme Court picked up the case again after a pause, Pacheco said that “what motivated” his proposed amendment was a possible ruling by the court to declare the current law unconstitutional. He contended that if the court decriminalized drug use, it would be “invading the jurisdiction” of Congress, as “it is up to the Parliament to decide whether something should be a crime or not.” About a week later, a key congressional committee moved quickly and approved the proposal, which is now being reviewed by the full Senate.

Brazil’s Supreme Court has the authority to strike down a law if it violates the constitution. In this case, it is assessing whether the current law violates fundamental rights. So far, five Supreme Court justices have voted in favor of decriminalizing the use of marijuana and three have voted against. Three other justices have yet to vote. If one of them votes in favor, a Supreme Court majority will have supported decriminalizing marijuana for personal use.

While the current law considers drug possession for personal use a crime, its sanctions do not include prison sentences but instead warnings, community service, or attending educational programs. Yet, having a criminal record subjects a person to discrimination and stigma that can lead to exclusion from jobs, housing, and other opportunities.

Some Supreme Court justices have proposed establishing a threshold quantity of marijuana to differentiate users from dealers. The current law does not determine this threshold, which leaves the assessment of who is a user and who is a dealer at the discretion of the police and the justice system. That opens the door to the discriminatory application of the law.

The proposed constitutional amendment could worsen the problem by entrenching in the constitution that users would be differentiated from dealers by “factual circumstances,” a vague provision that would be open to abuse.

While Black people make up about 57 percent of Brazil’s population, they are 68 percent of the defendants prosecuted for drug offenses. A 2023 study by a research institution linked to the government that examined the decisions in drug cases against 41,000 defendants in the first half of 2019 concluded that “the judicial processing of drug crimes punishes, as a priority, Black, young, and poorly educated people who possess small amounts of drugs.”

The lack of a legal distinction between users and dealers based on clearly-defined parameters has contributed to the explosive rise of Brazil’s prison population in the last two decades. In 2005, the year before Brazil’s drug law came to force, only 9 percent of those in prison were detained on drug charges, compared with the current 28 percent; among women, it is 51 percent.

In addition, Brazilian police regularly use drug law enforcement as a justification for raids into low-income neighborhoods that routinely end in killings. Police have killed more than 6,000 people per year since 2018, the vast majority of them Black.

In Brazil’s prisons, where criminal groups exploit appalling conditions to recruit new members, people who use drugs who have been wrongfully detained and tried as dealers, and small-scale dealers can be forced to seek the protection of the very criminal organizations the law is intended to fight. More broadly, drug prohibition creates an enormous source of wealth for organized crime, fueling corruption and violence.

Rather than criminalizing people who use drugs, authorities should focus on dismantling organized crime groups and the corrupt networks that support them, as well as ensuring accountability for serious violence. Governments should also explore alternatives to prohibition that are less reliant on criminalization and more focused on different forms of regulation and control.

Human Rights Watch research around the world has found that criminalizing the possession of drugs for personal use is inconsistent with the rights to autonomy and privacy, as well as the basic principle of proportionality in punishment. These principles are broadly recognized under international law, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the American Convention on Human Rights, both ratified by Brazil.

Criminalization also undermines the right to health. Fear of criminal penalties deters people who use drugs from using health services and treatment and increases their risk of suffering violence, discrimination, and serious illness. Criminal prohibitions have also impeded the use of drugs for legitimate medical research and have prevented patients from accessing drugs for palliative care and pain treatment.

The authorities should rely on non-penal regulatory and public health approaches to address problematic drug use, Human Rights Watch said.

Governments should not punish someone simply for using drugs when they aren’t harming others. To protect third parties from associated harm, such as driving under the influence, the authorities may impose, consistent with human rights principles, proportionate criminal penalties on behavior that causes or seriously risks harm to others, in conjunction with drug use.

“The personal use of drugs should be treated as an aspect of privacy and personal autonomy,” Carvalho said. “Lawmakers who want to address problematic drug use should heed international evidence that shows that decriminalization of consumption, combined with meaningful access to voluntary evidence-based treatment and other supports for people who are struggling, protects and promotes health much more effectively than the revolving door of criminalization.”

Sudan: One Year of Atrocities Requires New Global Approach

Human Rights Watch — Fri, 12 Apr 2024 23:00:00 -0400

(Nairobi) – As global and regional leaders meet in Paris to spotlight Sudan and mark the one-year anniversary of the country’s brutal conflict between Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and Rapid Support Forces (RSF), they should make clear that those responsible for ongoing atrocities and other violations of international humanitarian law will be held to account, Human Rights Watch said today. This includes widespread intentional killings of civilians, unlawful attacks on civilian infrastructure, as well as the deliberate looting of aid, which constitute war crimes.

On April 15, France alongside Germany and the European Union are cohosting a conference on Sudan to press for an end to the fighting and for a significant uptick in global funding for the grossly under-resourced response as a hunger and broader humanitarian crisis unravels in the country and in refugee hosting countries.

“The warring parties in Sudan have inflicted tremendous suffering on Sudanese from all walks of life. The global response to Sudan’s brutal conflict needs to change,” said Mohamed Osman, Sudan researcher at Human Rights Watch.“Leaders meeting in Paris should act to tackle the shamefully low levels of humanitarian funding, including for local responders, and commit to concrete measures against those deliberately hampering aid delivery to populations in need.”

The conference comes a year after conflict broke out between the SAF and RSF in Khartoum on April 15, 2023, before spreading to other regions including Darfur and central Sudan. Despite the magnitude of suffering and violations by the warring parties, the situation in Sudan has received an underwhelming response from the international community.

Almost 15,000 people are known to have been killed since then, almost certainly an underestimate. The conflict has uprooted 8.5 million people, most internally, making Sudan the world’s largest internal displacement crisis. Around 1.76 million people have fled into neighboring countries.Without significant humanitarian assistance, five million people could risk starvation in the coming months.

Both warring parties have committed serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law, amounting in some cases to war crimes and other atrocity crimes, Human Rights Watch said. The SAF have unlawfully killed civilians, carried out airstrikes that have deliberately targeted civilian infrastructure, and repeatedly obstructed humanitarian aid among other violations. The RSF has carried out widespread civilian killings, many of which appear to be ethnically targeted notably in West Darfur, while also hampering aid including by widespread looting of humanitarian supplies. They have used heavy explosive weapons in densely populated areas and engaged in widespread sexual violence and pillage. Both forces and their allies have recruited children and arbitrarily detained civilians.

According to the UN, approximately 25 million people, around half of the population, are now dependent on emergency food supplies, which SAF has deliberately restricted and RSF looted, in clear violation of international law, and in acts that could amount to war crimes, Human Rights Watch said.

Human Rights Watch interviews with aid workers described how authorities affiliated with SAF including its military intelligence have imposed a multitude of arbitrary bureaucratic restrictions that have hampered the work of humanitarian organizations and their ability to reach those in need. These include delays, denials, and nonresponse to requests for visas and travel permits, which the authorities require for aid personnel to move between federal states, as well as the imposition of excessive administrative procedures for importing and transporting relief materials. SAF’s unlawful obstruction of aid follows decades of hostility and routine obstruction towards international relief agencies under Sudan’s former President Omar al-Bashir, adding to the suffering of populations in conflict areas.

Rapid Support Forces and allied militias have repeatedly attacked and looted aid supplies and humanitarian infrastructure notably warehouses, such as the stocks in a World Food Programme (WFP) warehouse in Wad Madani in December 2023. “This attack – in areas controlled by the Rapid Support Forces – affected supplies that could have fed 1.5 million acutely food-insecure people for one whole month,” the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said. Communities in Darfur have also more recently accused the RSF of looting food supplies destined for displaced persons camps. The Darfur Network for Human Rights (DNHR), a rights monitoring group, said in an April 3 statement that RSF and Arab fighters looted aid supplies including food items for malnourished children from residents of an IDP camp in central Darfur.

Both parties, particularly SAF, have sought to restrict aid going to and through the opposing parties’ areas of control, which has put Khartoum under a de facto blockade since late 2023 and also hampered aid access in Darfur.

A local responder from Bahri city in Khartoum, said: “SAF is preventing any supplies entering the city and RSF is restricting movements within. We are forced to smuggle goods in including food, increasing prices of commodities as a result.”

WFP said on April 3 that it had managed to reach the Karrari locality in Omdurman, which is currently under SAF control, for the first time since December.

On March 6, Sudanese authorities informed the UN that they would only allow cross-border movement through specific crossings under the control of forces allied to the military, adding more financial and logistical challenges for humanitarian organizations.

On March 21, the RSF had released a statement on their official X (formerly known as Twitter) account saying they would not allow aid from Port Sudan to reach El Fashir, the capital of North Darfur, saying this plan will be used for rearmament purposes by SAF and their allies.

Warring parties killed, injured, and detained dozens of aid workers and targeted humanitarian convoys. In December, SAF attacked a convoy from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), which included civilians to be evacuated, killing two people and injuring seven including three ICRC staff. SAF said following the incident that ICRC had diverted from the agreed route and that they were escorted by RSF vehicles.

Given the blocks on the international aid response, Sudanese responders, many of whom volunteer in the country’s emergency rooms, have borne the brunt of seeking to meet civilians’ growing needs in Khartoum, Darfur, Al Gezira, and elsewhere. Both sides in the conflict have harassed, detained, and otherwise abused local responders. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights said in February said that both SAF and RSF were arbitrarily detaining thousands of civilians and had subjected hundreds to enforced disappearances including members of the emergency response rooms. Human Rights Watch has also documented RSF and SAF arbitrary arrests and mistreatment of emergency responders and healthcare workers in Khartoum.

The warring parties’ blatant disregard for international humanitarian and human rights law has caused the current humanitarian nightmare and left civilians in areas hit particularly hard by the fighting, notably Khartoum and its sister cities and large parts of Darfur, reeling and unable to access basic necessities.

Warring parties’ attacks, including of infrastructure such as healthcare facilities and water treatment plants, have made civilian lives precarious and insecure. Since the conflict’s onset, SAF forces have bombed and both parties have shelled health facilities, while the RSF has repeatedly occupied hospitals. The attacks on healthcare, many deliberate, have left 70-80 percent of healthcare facilities non-functional notably in Khartoum and Darfur. Even those deemed functional face massive challenges, due to lack of electricity, staffing and medical supplies including life-saving medication. “We cannot say there is a functioning health sector,” an international healthcare worker told Human Rights Watch in February. Warring parties’ relentless fighting in residential areas of Greater Khartoum, including using weaponry that frequently results in indiscriminate attacks in violation of the laws of war, over the course of the last year has also prevented the safe movement of civilians and local responders.

In May 2023, both parties committed to uphold international humanitarian law and allow aid delivery during talks hosted in Jeddah by Saudi Arabia and the United States and later joined by the African Union and the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD). With reports of a resumption of the Jeddah talks, the hosts should press for the establishment of a mechanism that will monitor implementation of the commitments to uphold international humanitarian and human rights law and protect civilians, including calling out attacks on and deliberate obstruction of humanitarian assistance and unlawful destruction of civilian infrastructure.

UN Security Council and African Union Peace and Security Council member states should maintain scrutiny over the food security situation, by holding regular public briefings over the next six months.

The United States, United Kingdom, and European Union and other countries should coordinate action under their respective sanction regimes on Sudan and urgently designate entities and individuals responsible for aid obstruction and other grave violations.

Governments meeting in Paris should also actively and publicly support efforts to investigate ongoing abuses on the ground, Human Rights Watch said. The office of the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) announced in July 2023 that it is investigating recent crimes committed in Darfur as part of his office’s ongoing Darfur investigations. The independent international fact-finding mission on Sudan, established by the UN Human Rights Council in October, and mandated to investigate violations across Sudan, including in Khartoum and Darfur, should be given full support and access, and be renewed as needed until investigations are complete.

“The world should be ashamed by the horrific cost of its inaction. Civilians in Sudan deserve to see a robust, concerted global response,” said Osman. “The Paris conference should not be where the focus on Sudan ends, but rather jumpstart a new approach, announcing major increases in humanitarian funding, including for local responders, and spelling out clear benchmarks and concrete measures states will take to end the weaponization of aid by both warring parties.”

Belarus Calls LGBT Lives ‘Pornography’

Human Rights Watch — Fri, 12 Apr 2024 18:01:37 -0400

Belarus has hit a new low in its targeting of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people. As of today, the definition of pornography under Belarusian law will include depictions of same-sex relationships as well as transgender people.

The Culture Ministry recently amended its decree on “erotic materials” to classify “homosexualism, lesbian love” and the “desire to live and be seen by others as a person of an opposite sex”—a reference to transgender people—as “non-traditional sexual relationship or behavior.” This places depictions of LGBT people alongside those of necrophilia, pedophilia, and voyeurism, all of which legally constitute “non-traditional relationships.”

Under Belarusian law, they all may also constitute pornography.

Public displays of pornography are punishable in Belarus with up to four years in prison. Child pornography is punishable with up to 13 years behind bars.

While it is not yet clear what kinds of depictions of LGBT people could fall under the new definition of pornography, it clearly aims to assault the dignity of sexual and gender minorities, people already demonized and at risk of persecution in Belarus.

Belarusian public officials and religious groups periodically advocate for introducing administrative and criminal liability for “non-traditional sexual relationship and gender change propaganda.” Neighboring Russia recently expanded its anti-gay propaganda law and banned the “international LGBT movement” as extremist.

In 2020, police arrested numerous peaceful protesters who demonstrated against the rigged presidential elections. Belarusian rights groups documented the systematic and widespread ill-treatment and torture of the protesters, reporting that people perceived as LGBT faced an increased risk of police violence and threats of sexualized violence.

Since then, Belarusian authorities have used public humiliation as a shaming tool against critics who are perceived to be or are LGBT. In one such instance, police forced a detainee, arrested for leaving a critical comment online, to “confess” on camera to being gay. At the end of the horrific video, he said: “I understand this is immoral, I promise to correct it.”

In their brutal assault against civil society in recent years, Belarusian authorities shut down all human rights organizations, including LGBT rights groups, leaving LGBT people with even less protection.

Belarus should annul these despicable amendments and stop cynically targeting LGBT people.

Germany: Landmark Vote for Trans Rights Law

Human Rights Watch — Fri, 12 Apr 2024 13:14:58 -0400

(Berlin, April 12, 2024) – Germany’s parliament on April 12, 2024, passed a landmark law that allows transgender and non-binary people to modify their legal documents to reflect their gender identity through an administrative procedure based on self-identification, Human Rights Watch said today. The law will take effect in August 2024.

The new law replaces Germany’s outdated 1980 Transsexuals Law (Transsexuellengesetz), which requires trans people to provide a local court with two “expert reports” attesting to “a high degree of probability” that the applicant will not want to revert to their previous legal gender. The German Constitutional Court had previously struck down other draconian aspects of the law, including surgical requirements for gender recognition.

“Germany has joined a growing list of countries that are abolishing pathologizing requirements for gender recognition, which have no place in diverse and democratic societies,” said Cristian González Cabrera, senior LGBT rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. “As populist politicians in Europe and beyond try to use trans rights as a political wedge issue, Germany’s new law sends a strong message that trans people exist and deserve recognition and protection, without discrimination.”

Under the new law, trans and non-binary people will be able to go to a civil registry office and have their gender marker and their given names changed through a simple declaration. No “expert” opinions or medical certificates will be required. The applicant will be able to choose from several gender markers – male, female, or “diverse” – or opt not to enter a gender at all.

According to a 2017 report from the Federal Ministry of Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth, under the Transsexuals Law, applicants said that to secure the necessary “expert” reports, they had to disclose immaterial details from their childhood and their sexual past, and even undergo physical examinations. The ministry found that the legal procedure could take up 20 months and cost an average of €1,868 (about. US$2,000).

The gender recognition reform comes as lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) activists warn of an uptick in anti-LGBT violence in Germany. The federal interior minister said in June 2023 that in the preceding year the police registered over 1,400 hate crimes against LGBT people. Several attacks occurred at Pride parades in recent years, one of which ended in the death of a trans man in 2022.

In May 2023, the federal human rights commissioner expressed worries about setbacks for LGBT rights. In June 2023, state-level interior ministers committed to strengthening their prevention of anti-LGBT hate crimes and violence, including through law enforcement training and the introduction of designated contact people at police stations throughout Germany.

Legal gender recognition reform based on self-declaration will not in itself ensure protection for trans people in Germany from abuse and discrimination. But the new law indicates that the government supports trans and non-binary people’s fundamental rights, which contributes to a broader understanding and acceptance of diverse gender identities, Human Rights Watch said.

A growing number of countries have removed burdensome requirements for legal gender recognition, including medical or psychological evaluation. Countries including Argentina, Belgium, Denmark, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, Norway, Portugal, Spain, and Uruguay provide for simple administrative legal gender recognition processes based on self-declaration.

The move toward such straightforward administrative procedures reflects international medical consensus and human rights standards. The World Professional Association for Transgender Health, an interdisciplinary professional association with members worldwide, has found that medical and other barriers to gender recognition for transgender people, including diagnostic requirements, “may harm physical and mental health.” The most recent International Classification of Diseases, the World Health Organization’s global diagnostic manual, formally depathologizes trans identities.

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which Germany is a party, provides for equal civil and political rights for all, everyone’s right to recognition before the law, and the right to privacy. The United Nations Human Rights Committee, in charge of interpreting the ICCPR, has called on governments to guarantee the rights of transgender people, including the right to legal recognition of their gender, and for countries to repeal abusive and disproportionate requirements for legal recognition of gender identity.

The European Court of Human Rights ruled in Goodwin v. United Kingdom that the “conflict between social reality and law” that arises when the government does not recognize a person’s gender identity constitutes a “serious interference with private life.” Since then, the court has ruled that various abusive requirements for gender recognition, like sterilization and other medical interventions, violate trans people’s human rights.

The European Union’s LGBTIQ Equality Strategy (2020-2025) also upholds “accessible legal gender recognition based on self-determination and without age restriction” as the human rights standard in the member bloc.

Principle three of the Yogyakarta Principles on the Application of International Human Rights Law in relation to Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity affirms that each person’s self-defined gender identity “is integral to their personality and is one of the most basic aspects of self-determination, dignity, and freedom.”

As a member of the Equal Rights Coalition, the Global Equality Fund, and the UN LGBTI Core Group, Germany plays a key role in advocating for LGBT and intersex (LGBTI) rights beyond its borders. In March 2021, the federal government pledged to do more through a LGBTI Inclusion Strategy, which, among its many goals, aims to further Germany’s role in promoting LGBTI people’s rights at international and regional human rights institutions.

“Germany’s gender recognition reform removes a stain on its national human rights record and bolsters its commitments to LGBT rights at home and abroad,” González said. “Following this critical reform to legal gender recognition, German authorities should continue to push for full equality, to eliminate acts of anti-LGBT violence in Germany and to promote anti-LGBT legislation overseas.”

Germany’s Antisemitism Battle Needs Focus on Education

Human Rights Watch — Fri, 12 Apr 2024 06:00:00 -0400

In early February, a 30-year-old Jewish student was hospitalized following an attack by a fellow student at Berlin’s largest public university, Freie Universität Berlin.

Berlin’s authorities treated the attack as politically motivated antisemitic violence and attributed it to the impact in Europe of the escalation in the Israel-Palestine conflict. In response to the attack, Germany’s antisemitism commissioner demanded a clear stance against antisemitism from the university leadership.

Berlin has a dedicated general commissioner on antisemitism at the state level as well as within its state police and prosecution office, with the latter two focused on the criminal justice response to antisemitism. They are in regular contact with Jewish communities and groups.

In March, Human Rights Watch met with Winfrid Wenzel, antisemitism commissioner for the Berlin Police Department. His role is to liaise with police officers to ensure effective recognition and recording of antisemitic crimes. He also works to build trust among Jewish communities in the police force.

Wenzel shared information showing that in 2023, police recorded 72 acts of antisemitic violence in Berlin. The frequency of antisemitic violence suggests policing can’t be the sole answer to hate crimes.

International guidelines have demonstrated the critical role education plays in countering the bias and prejudice that underlies antisemitism. The European Commission against Racism and Intolerance highlights the need for educational institutions to be equipped to respond effectively to antisemitic attacks and promote an understanding of antisemitism among students. The German government’s Strategy against Antisemitism and for Jewish Life also highlighted education as a “lifelong goal” to prevent antisemitism.

Last month, Berlin’s state government reacted to the violence, threats, and intimidation faced by Jewish students on campuses with assurances that it was in “intense communication” with universities to guarantee the safety of Jewish students. As of April 1, when the new semester began, universities in Berlin have been asked to strengthen their security protocols relating to antisemitic incidents to ensure students are better supported.

Freie Universität Berlin decided to ban the alleged perpetrator of the attack from campus for a preliminary three-month period; but there is broader work that must be done by German universities to build trust among Jewish students and assure them of their safety. In addition to appointing a contact person on antisemitism, universities should actively raise awareness about antisemitism and other forms of discrimination on campus and create inclusive and open platforms for dialogue and mutual learning.

Mali: Junta Suspends Political Parties, Associations

Human Rights Watch — Fri, 12 Apr 2024 00:00:00 -0400

(Nairobi) – Mali’s transitional military government should immediately reverse its suspension of political parties and associations, Human Rights Watch said today. The suspension violates both Malian law and the rights to freedom of expression, association, and assembly under international human rights law.

On April 10, 2024, the council of ministers adopted a decree suspending the activities of political parties and associations across the country “until further notice.” On April 11, the Malian communications regulatory body (Haute autorité de la communication) directed all media to stop “broadcasting and publishing the activities” of political parties and associations. The action appeared to be in response to the March 31 call by more than 80 political parties and associations for a return to constitutional order by holding presidential elections as soon as possible. The military junta, which seized power in a coup in May 2021, had announced in September that the elections scheduled for March 26 would be delayed indefinitely for technical reasons.

“The Malian authorities apparently suspended all political parties and associations because they didn’t like their call to hold democratic elections,” said Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Sahel researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Mali’s junta, like all governments, needs to respect human rights, and should immediately lift the suspension.”

Following months of renewed hostilities between separatist armed groups and Malian forces in the northern part of the country, Col. Assimi Goita, Mali’s military president, announced on December 31, 2023, the establishment of an “inter-Malian dialogue for peace and reconciliation,” aimed at eliminating “the roots of community and intercommunity conflicts” by prioritizing “national ownership of the peace process.” In an April 10 news release, Col. Abdoulaye Maïga, the minister of territorial administration, claimed the suspension of political parties and associations was justified to ensure that the inter-Malian dialogue “[would] take place in a climate of serenity and not cacophony.”

“The minister’s declaration has contradictions,” said a member of the political party African Solidarity for Democracy and Independence (Solidarité africaine pour la démocratie et l'indépendance, SADI). “Authorities are inviting people to the national dialogue, and at the same time are stripping them of their political clothes. … Who do they [authorities] want to attend the dialogue? People should be entitled to participate both as citizens and as political leaders or members of political parties.”

In January, the authorities took legal action against the SADI party, threatening to dissolve it, following a message posted on social networks by its leader, Oumar Mariko. Mariko had alleged that the Malian armed forces had committed war crimes against members of the Strategic Permanent Framework (Cadre stratégique permanent), a coalition of armed and political groups from northern Mali.

Since the military coup, Mali’s junta has increasingly cracked down on peaceful dissent, political opposition, civil society, and the media, shrinking the country’s civic space, Human Rights Watch said.

On March 13, the minister of territorial administration dissolved the Association of Pupils and Students of Mali (L’Association des élèves et étudiants du Mali) accusing its members of “violence and clashes in schools and universities.” The association was the fourth organization that the government dissolved in less than four months. On March 6, the authorities had dissolved the Coordination of Movements, Associations, and Sympathizers of Imam Mahmoud Dicko (Coordination des mouvements, associations et sympathisants de l’imam Mahmoud Dicko), which had been calling for presidential elections as part of restoring civilian democratic rule, accusing it of “destabilization and threat to public security.”

On February 28, the authorities had dissolved the political organization Kaoural Renewal (Kaoural Renouveau), citing “defamatory and subversive remarks” against the military junta. And on December 20, the authorities had dissolved the Observatory for Elections and Good Governance (Observatoire pour les élections et la bonne gouvernance), a civil society group that monitored the fairness of elections, accusing its chairman of “statements likely to disturb public order.”

The junta has also targeted dissidents and whistleblowers. On March 4, the authorities forcibly disappeared gendarmerie Col. Alpha Yaya Sangaré, who had recently published a book about abuses by the Malian armed forces. His whereabouts remain unknown.

A Malian human rights activist said that “the authorities want to maintain a monopoly over political power by denying opponents the right to express their views and conduct political activities.”

Mali’s constitution and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Mali ratified in 1974, protect the rights to freedom of association, expression, and peaceful assembly. Article 25 of the ICCPR ensures the right of citizens to participate in public affairs. The United Nations Human Rights Committee, the body of independent experts that monitor state compliance with the convention, has upheld everyone’s right to “join organizations and associations concerned with political and public affairs.”

“The junta’s decision to suspend political parties is part of its relentless crackdown on peaceful opposition and dissent,” Allegrozzi said. “The authorities should immediately lift the suspension, allow the political parties and associations to operate freely, and commit to upholding fundamental rights and freedoms.”

Thailand: Halt Forced Returns to Myanmar

Human Rights Watch — Thu, 11 Apr 2024 09:30:00 -0400

(Bangkok) – The Thai government’s decision not to forcibly return 19 children to Myanmar should be expanded to include all refugees from Myanmar, Human Rights Watch said today.

On March 12, 2024, officials from Thai immigration and the Ministry of Social Development and Human Security took 19 Myanmar children, ages 5 to 17, from Wat Sawang Arom School in Lopburi province in central Thailand and brought them without their parents to the border in Chiang Rai province prior to repatriating them to Myanmar. Thai members of parliament, human rights groups, and the National Human Rights Commission of Thailand strongly criticized the planned return. On March 26, Social Development and Human Security Minister Varawut Silpa-archa said in a media interview that his agency would not return the 19 children to Myanmar, and that they could remain in Thailand.

“Thai authorities showed sympathy and support by allowing 19 children from Myanmar to remain in Thailand,” said Elaine Pearson, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The government’s next step should be to assure all those fleeing Myanmar that they can seek protection in Thailand.”

Prior to Varawut’s announcement, Thai officials had said that the 19 children were “undocumented” and were irregularly living in Thailand. The previous government in July 2023 had used a similar argument to justify sending back 126 “undocumented” Myanmar children from a school in Ang Thong province, despite concerns raised by the National Human Rights Commission of Thailand and human rights groups.

Varawut’s assurances that these 19 children could remain in Thailand should become Thai government policy for all Myanmar refugees, as long as the human rights situation in Myanmar remains dire, Human Rights Watch said. Fighting since early April around the Myanmar border town of Myawaddy, opposite Mae Sot in Thailand’s Tak province, has raised concerns about future influxes of refugees.

Thai Foreign Minister Parnpree Bahiddha-Nukara said on April 9 that the government has prepared to receive up to 100,000 refugees temporarily.

Not everyone fleeing conflict and rights abuses in Myanmar has been able to seek protection in Thailand. In late October, the Thai military forcibly returned thousands of refugees who had been sheltering in border areas next to Myanmar’s Karenni State.

Any forced returns to Myanmar may violate Thailand’s obligations as a party to the Convention Against Torture and the customary international law principle prohibiting refoulement, the forcible return of anyone to a place where they would face a genuine risk of persecution, torture or other ill-treatment, or a threat to their life.

Since the February 2021 coup, Myanmar’s military junta has carried out a nationwide campaign of mass killings, torture, arbitrary arrests, and indiscriminate attacks that amount to crimes against humanity and war crimes. More than two million people have been internally displaced and more than 109,000 refugees have fled to neighboring countries.

The Thai government should promptly fulfill its pledge at the Global Refugee Forum in December 2023 to withdraw its reservation to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Article 22 guarantees the rights of refugee children, but Thailand’s reservation calls for refugee children to be treated “subject to the national laws, regulations and prevailing practices in Thailand.” The convention also contains protections for children from being forcibly separated from their parents.

Thailand should also provide protection and support to all refugees, including by permitting the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, to undertake refugee status determinations.

“The deteriorating human rights situation in Myanmar could mean that Thailand receives many more refugees in the near future,” Pearson said. “While the Thai government should be assuring refugees that they will not be returned into harm’s way, concerned governments should be prepared to support Thailand to provide protection.”

Nigeria: 10 Years After Chibok, Schoolchildren Still at Risk

Human Rights Watch — Thu, 11 Apr 2024 02:00:00 -0400

(Abuja) –Ten years after the abduction of over 200 schoolgirls in Chibok, Nigerian authorities have failed to put in place and sustain crucial measures to provide a secure learning environment for every child, Human Rights Watch said today.

Since 2014, according to Save the Children, more than 1,600 children have been abducted or kidnapped across northern Nigeria. In the northeast, the armed conflict between Boko Haram and Nigerian armed forces continues to take its toll and, in the northwest, criminal groups commonly called bandits are terrorizing communities. During February and March 2024 alone, bandits kidnapped over 200 children from their schools in Kaduna and Sokoto states.

“For many children across northern Nigeria, the pursuit of an education means facing the constant threat of abduction or kidnapping,” said Anietie Ewang, Nigeria researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Children should never face the harrowing dilemma of sacrificing their safety for education, but this untenable choice, which echoes the profound insecurity plaguing the country, is thrust upon them daily.”

On April 14, 2014, Boko Haram, an Islamist armed group, abducted 276 girls from their school in Chibok, a town in northeastern Borno state, sparking global outrage. Although some of the girls escaped, or were released or rescued, 96 remain in captivity according to UNICEF, and civil society groups continue to pressure the government to ensure they are rescued. Boko Haram, known for its opposition to education, has carried out other such abductions, including one of 110 girls from a school in Dapchi, a town in Yobe state, in 2018.

In addition to kidnappings by Boko Haram in the northeast, the ongoing banditry crisis in the northwest has in recent years made that area a hub for criminal kidnapping for ransom. The crisis emerged after years of conflict between herders and farmers, giving rise to the criminal groups, which have carried out widespread killings, looting, extortion, and kidnapping for ransom in mostly rural communities.

Between December 2020 and February 2021, a series of high-profile incidents, including the abduction of over 600 schoolchildren across Zamfara, Katsina, and Niger states, thrust the kidnapping issue into the spotlight.

In the aftermath of Chibok, the Nigerian government endorsed the Safe Schools Declaration, an international political commitment to protect education from attack and schools from military use which turns them into targets. The government also adopted a Safe School Initiative for Nigeria with the support of the global community and Nigerian business leaders. The initiative aimed to raise funds with an initial US$10 million pledge to help make schools safer, including by moving them to safer areas and creating a safe school model for schools across Borno, Adamawa, and Yobe, the three states worst hit by the Boko Haram insurgency.

However, the multi-stakeholder initiative faced problems, and there has been a decline in momentum over the years with little or no progress made in fortifying schools, Human Rights Watch said. In 2021, Nigeria’s then-Senate president Ahmad Lawan, following an investigation into the utilization of the funds for the initiative, declared that it was designed to fail without a National Policy and Strategy for the Safe School Initiative and the leadership of the Federal Education Ministry. In the meantime, communities continue to suffer the brunt of bandit attacks and schoolchildren remain vulnerable prey.

A Chibok girl who was in Boko Haram captivity for over two years, and was released with 20 others, told Human Rights Watch that news of school kidnappings brings back memories of her ordeal. “Whenever I hear that more children have been kidnapped, I feel terrible, helpless,” she said. “We are still not safe ... It brings back memories of what happened to me. I can never forget being snatched from my parents, my family for so long. I pray this is not the case for those that are kidnapped.” She is now a 28-year-old university student studying natural and environmental sciences.

Kemi Okenyodo, an expert in security and governance and the executive director of the Rule of Law and Empowerment Initiative in Abuja, told Human Rights Watch that the ongoing school kidnappings, resembling those in Chibok a decade ago, highlight a failure to learn from past experiences, as they are taking place without adequate security infrastructure or intervention from authorities to prevent dozens or hundreds of children being snatched away at once.

Amid the heightened threat of attacks on schools, many have been forced to shut down completely, with more than 20 million children out of school in Nigeria, according to UNESCO, among the highest number in any country in the world. According to UNICEF, 66 percent of out-of-school children in Nigeria are from the northeast and northwest, which are among the poorest regions in the country.

For girls especially, the challenges are double edged. They risk rape and other forms of sexual violence if kidnapped, and if kept out of school, they risk child marriage, which is a common practice in these regions.

In 2021, the government adopted the National Policy on Safety, Security and Violence Free Schools aimed at improving school security, strengthening the capabilities of security agents to respond to threats, and ensuring that education continues for children displaced by conflict and crisis, among other reasons.

The authorities committed to investing 144.8 billion naira (about $314.5 million at the time) over a certain period to finance this initiative. In 2023, they announced that 15 billion naira (about $24 million at the time) had been earmarked to pilot the initiative in 18 high-risk states and 48 schools. However, details of the implementation are sparse, and it remains unclear the extent to which this has been done.

Okenyodo told Human Rights Watch that the government needs to involve communities in designing and implementing initiatives to make schools safer to create a sense of ownership and reduce inefficiency and corruption.

“Now more than ever, the Nigerian authorities should step up efforts to make learning safe for children,” Ewang said. “They should work with communities to adopt rights-respecting measures and put in place adequate financing, systems, and structures to ensure quick, effective, and transparent implementation to ensure that children can learn without being exposed to grave harm.”

France: Groups Seek UN Intervention to Address Racial Profiling

Human Rights Watch — Thu, 11 Apr 2024 02:00:00 -0400

(Paris, April 11, 2024) – Racial profiling by French police violates international human rights law, five French and international groups said in a complaint filed today with the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD).

Although in France the Council of State recognized in October 2023 that racial profiling by the police is not limited to “isolated cases,” the government has taken no action to address the problem. This inaction led the five groups to lodge a complaint before the UN Committee, which monitors compliance with the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. France is a party to the treaty.

The groups are Community House for Solidarity Development (Maison Communautaire pour un Dévelopement Solidaire, MCDS); Pazapas; Equality, Anti-discrimination, Interdisciplinary Justice Network (Réseau Egalité, Antidiscrimination, Justice Interdisciplinaire, Reaji); Amnesty International France; and Human Rights Watch.

The groups have been working to eliminate racial profiling by French law enforcement since a landmark Court of Cassation ruling in 2016 condemning the French state for “gross misconduct that engages the responsibility of the state” in five cases of identity checks.

As evidenced by an extensive body of research, reports from independent institutions, including the French Defender of Rights, and testimony from numerous victims as well as police officers, racial profiling particularly targets Black and Arab young men and boys or those perceived as such, including children as young as 10. These abusive and illegal identity checks, which are widespread throughout the country and deeply rooted in police practices, constitute systemic racial discrimination.

The groups are asking the United Nations’ expert body on racial discrimination to recognize the systemic nature of the problem of racial profiling in France, and set out specific steps the French government should take to eliminate racial profiling.

The persistence and scale of the scourge of racial profiling has been recognized by numerous rights bodies, including national ones like the Defender of Rights (Défenseur des Droits, DDD) and the French National Consultative Commission on Human Rights (Commission nationale consultative des droits de l'homme, CNCDH) as well as European bodies like the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI).

In the context of the class action before the Council of State, the DDD and the former United Nations special rapporteur on racism drafted voluntary interventions in support of the associations' arguments.

By failing to take the necessary measures to put an end to this practice, the French government is failing to meet its obligations under several international treaties, including the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, the organizations said.

The groups outlined the measures that the government should take to put an end to systematic racial profiling by police in France. These measures include:

Redefining and clarifying the legal framework for police identity checks to eliminate discrimination by requiring objective and individualized grounds for all checks, clarifying the prohibition of discrimination, and establishing specific regulations and instructions for stops targeting children; Creating traceability for all such stops and identity checks by the police by creating a system for recording and evaluating the justification for each identity check, while requiring the police to issue those stopped with a record of the action; Strengthening victims’ rights by providing a system for effective recourse to an independent complaints mechanism; Changing the institutional objectives, guidelines, and training for the police, including with respect to interactions with the public.

The associations therefore wish to bring these failings to the attention of UN Committee’s independent experts, who have already expressed concerns about France’s failure to address police violence in the context of systemic racism.

MCDS, Pazapas, and Reaji are represented before CERD by the organization (Re)Claim.

Global Failures on Healthcare Funding

Human Rights Watch — Thu, 11 Apr 2024 00:01:00 -0400

Click to expand Image A health worker checks her smartphone amid the coronavirus pandemic, at the intensive care unit of the Ana Francisca Perez de Leon II public Hospital in Caracas, Venezuela, March 27, 2021. © 2021 AP Photo/Matias Delacroix

(Washington) – New data from the World Health Organization (WHO) shows that many governments around the world did not meet public healthcare spending benchmarks amid the Covid-19 pandemic, Human Rights Watch said today. The new information indicates possible violations of countries’ obligations to the human right to health.

WHO’s Global Health Expenditure Database, released in December 2023, shows that most governments did not spend more than 5 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) or 15 percent of their national budget on health care through public means in 2021. These two benchmarks are common and important tools for assessing whether countries are on track to ensure universal health coverage, an international policy target grounded in the human right to the highest attainable standard of health. Despite a global surge in spending related to the Covid-19 pandemic, about 80 percent of the world’s population lived in countries that met neither spending benchmark.

“When governments neglect to invest in their healthcare systems, people and families end up shouldering the burden,” said Matt McConnell, economic justice and rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. “While more spending is not enough on its own to ensure universal access to high quality healthcare services, it can help shift this burden, which causes the most harm for people with the fewest resources.”

The Human Rights Watch analysis of healthcare spending in more than 190 countries around the world, available in a summary table at the end of this document, also found that:

Despite a mass increase in healthcare spending across the globe in response to the pandemic, 38 governments spent less on health care in 2021, as a share of their GDP, than the year before it began. Despite governments’ commitments to reduce out-of-pocket expenditures, individuals and their households collectively paid the equivalent of about US$1.68 trillion for health care out of their own pockets in 2021, a figure comparable to the annual GDP of Australia or the Republic of Korea. At the height of the pandemic, out-of-pocket payments covered the costs of more than 20 percent of health care in 119 countries. Only high-income countries averaged less than 20 percent in 2021 (17 percent), while upper-middle (29.9 percent), lower-middle (34.6 percent), and low-income (39.1 percent) countries averaged far more. In 47 countries in 2021, individuals and their households collectively paid more out-of-pocket for health care than their governments spent on it. Twenty years after agreeing to the Abuja Declaration and committing to spend at least 15 percent of their national budgets on health care, only 2 of the African Union’s 55 member countries met this target in 2021: Cabo Verde (15.75 percent) and South Africa (15.29 percent). On the whole, countries in the African Union spent an average of 7.35 percent of their national budgets on health care that year. Eighty-three governments paid more per person to service their external public and publicly guaranteed debts in 2021 than on health care.

The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights requires countries to dedicate the maximum available resources toward the progressive realization of economic, social, and cultural rights, which includes ensuring universal access to quality healthcare services. They should also avoid, unless fully justified, any backward steps, including through budget cuts.

The next few months will provide multiple opportunities for governments to do more than just renew their rhetorical commitments to the realization of the right to health, including at the 77th World Health Assembly in May, at the United Nations Summit of the Future in September, and at the fourth International Conference on Financing for Development in 2025.

Governments should, among other things, set spending benchmarks such as the equivalent of at least 5 percent of GDP or 15 percent of general government expenditures on health care through domestically generated public funds, or an amount that otherwise ensures the maximum available resources for the realization of rights, including the right to health.

Many governments could increase their revenues to fund health care by levying progressive taxes, stemming tax abuses, and tackling public corruption. Wealthier creditor governments should also deliver on their commitments to international assistance and cooperation by ensuring that public debt repayments do not hinder debtor governments’ ability to adequately fund health care.

The coming months also provide an opportunity to address the impact of debt payments on the ability of governments to fund human rights obligations. At the 2024 spring meetings of the World Bank Group and International Monetary Fund, creditor governments and institutions should commit to conducting assessments of such impacts and to considering debt restructuring or relief where appropriate to ensure that debtor governments can adequately protect rights, including health.

“The pandemic showed the vulnerability of healthcare systems around the world to external shocks,” McConnell said. “But it also exposed just how many of these systems were already failing people. Governments need to put their money where their mouth is and commit to financing more resilient, more sustainable, and more rights-realizing healthcare systems for all.”

Health Budgets Under International Human Rights Law

International human rights law includes obligations to respect, protect, and fulfill economic, social, and cultural rights, which includes the right to health.

Governments have the duty to make constant progress toward realizing these rights, and to do the best within their capacities (an obligation to use “the maximum of their available resources”) to reach the highest possible standards of these rights. Retrogressive measures, which can include a decrease in funding for realization of a right, are presumptively a violation of this obligation unless fully justified, such as in some cases of natural catastrophe or financial crisis.

The ultimate measure of progress is the impact of spending on people’s health. For example, the United States spent about 9.6 percent of its GDP on health care through public means in 2021, about 2.56 percentage points above the average among countries in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). But the impact of this spending on healthcare outcomes was low when compared with other OECD countries, with the US having the lowest life expectancy at birth, the highest death rates for avoidable or treatable conditions, among the highest suicide rates, and among the worst maternal mortality within the OECD in 2021.

There are many reasons why the US healthcare system is expensive, complicated, and does not work for the vast majority of people in the US. But as recent Human Rights Watch research has illustrated, its expensive, largely market-based healthcare system and failure to appropriately regulate pharmaceutical companies and private healthcare serviceproviders produces immense disparities of access and quality that disproportionately affect people with lower incomes and people with medical conditions.

Funding is a key indicator of a government’s priorities, though how much a government spends on health care also does not necessarily capture all its efforts, or lack thereof, to realize the right to health. This includes other indicators, such as laws and policies that effectively address structural or other discrimination, or efforts to improve the social determinants of health with better food, water, housing, and education. Additionally, the reliability and accuracy of official records and other government data, upon which the WHO’s estimates largely depend, can differ, particularly among countries that are less transparent and publicly accountable.

Comparing Public Healthcare Spending to International Benchmarks

Two of the most common and useful ways of assessing governments’ healthcare spending are by comparing public healthcare expenditures to either (1) the size of the country’s economic output (that is, Gross Domestic Product or “GDP”); and (2) to the size of a country’s total national budget.

Status of Global Public Healthcare Spending, 2021

Benchmark

Global Median

Global Average

Countries & Est. Pop. Above (#/%)

Countries & Est. Pop. Below (#/%)

5% of GDP

3.54%

4.08%

63 Countries; or about 1.4 billion people (18% of world pop.)

126 Countries; or about 6.3 billion people (82% of world pop.)

15% of National Budget

10.53%

11.22%

47 Countries; or about 1.4 billion people (18% of world pop.)

142 Countries; or about 6.3 billion people (82% of world pop.)

Benchmark 1: Percentage of GDP Needed to Fulfill Universal Coverage

The WHO has estimated that providing universal health coverage, a goal distinct from but grounded in the human right to universally accessible health care, will generally require governments to spend the equivalent of at least 5 to 6 percent of their GDP on health care. It has used a 5-percent-of-GDP figure as an indicator to monitor health spending for several decades.

Numerous other assessments of the cost for achieving universal health coverage and related healthcare goals have similarly coalesced around this range. For example, a 2017 review of health economics literature conducted by academics at the University of Cape Town and Harvard University found that:

Government spending of about 6 percent of GDP reduces the incidence of financial catastrophe and impoverishment from out-of-pocket payments to negligible levels, in-line with WHO guidelines; Government spending on health of more than 5 percent of GDP will achieve the very conservative coverage target of 90 percent, set by the WHO’s Commission on Macroeconomics and Health, for 2 fundamental healthcare access and utilization indicators (that is, deliveries performed by a skilled birth attendant and child immunization).

Many of these healthcare goals correspond with several targets and indicators for Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) No. 3, one of the 17 SDGs adopted by all UN Member States in 2015 as part of a global plan to drive economic prosperity and social well-being. When Human Rights Watch compared the WHO healthcare expenditure data with the WHO’s UHC Service Coverage Index, which measures countries’ progress toward SDG 3.8.1 (i.e. “Coverage of essential health services”), there was a moderate-to-strong, positive correlation between public healthcare spending as a percentage of GDP and coverage for essential healthcare services. In general, the more a country spends on health care through public means, the greater share of its population has access to essential healthcare goods and services.

In 2021, however, the last year for which global data is available, the global median public healthcare expenditure was only 3.54 percent of GDP, well below that benchmark. Only 63 of 189 governments spent the equivalent of more than 5 percent of their GDP on health care in 2021. This means that, despite being at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, 126 countries – governing about 82 percent of the world’s population, or 6.3 billion people – spent less than 5 percent of their GDP on health care through public means in 2021.

Public Healthcare Spending (GGHE-D) as Percent GDP, 2021 2021 Public Health Spending (GGHE-D) as % GDP

Source: World Health Organization, Global Health Expenditure Database

Data: Public Healthcare Spending (GGHE-D) as Percent GDP, 2021 2021 Public Health Spending (GGHE-D) as % GDP percent Country 0.72 Afghanistan 2.88 Albania 3.27 Algeria 6.17 Andorra 1.71 Angola 3.93 Antigua and Barbuda 1.74 Egypt 6.14 Argentina 2.19 Armenia 8.02 Australia 9.47 Austria 1.49 Azerbaijan 2.81 Bahrain 0.4 Bangladesh 4.38 Barbados 4.87 Belarus 8.57 Belgium 3.43 Belize 0.32 Benin 2.21 Bhutan 5.88 Bolivia 6.53 Bosnia and Herzegovina 4.82 Botswana 4.5 Brazil 2.06 Brunei 5.38 Bulgaria 2.73 Burkina Faso 2.23 Burundi 2 Cambodia 0.48 Cameroon 8.99 Canada 4.71 Cape Verde 1.26 Central African Republic 0.9 Chad 5.2 Chile 2.91 China and Tibet 6.55 Colombia 0.94 Comoros 1.9 Congo (Brazzaville) 3.66 Cook Islands 5.3 Costa Rica 1.03 Côte d'Ivoire 6.81 Croatia 12.63 Cuba 7.99 Cyprus 8.18 Czech Republic 0.63 Democratic Republic of Congo 9.22 Denmark 0.97 Djibouti 4.17 Dominica 3.29 Dominican Republic 5.28 Ecuador 6.4 El Salvador 0.68 Equatorial Guinea 0.88 Eritrea 5.71 Estonia 3.73 Eswatini 0.98 Ethiopia 1.89 Federated States of Micronesia 3.36 Fiji 8.41 Finland 9.31 France 1.59 Gabon 4.49 Georgia 10.22 Germany 2.24 Ghana 5.43 Greece 2.22 Grenada 2.33 Guatemala 0.69 Guinea 1.14 Guinea-Bissau 3.34 Guyana 0.43 Haiti 3.44 Honduras 5.33 Hungary 8.14 Iceland 1.12 India 2.2 Indonesia 2.59 Iraq 5.2 Ireland 3.19 Iran 5.39 Israel/Palestine 7.08 Italy 5.12 Jamaica 9.17 Japan 2.59 Jordan 2.56 Kazakhstan 2.22 Kenya 11.12 Kiribati 5.19 Kuwait 2.91 Kyrgyzstan 0.72 Laos 6.27 Latvia 2.9 Lebanon 4.2 Lesotho 1.09 Liberia 5.26 Lithuania 4.93 Luxembourg 0.74 Madagascar 1.36 Malawi 2.46 Malaysia 7.18 Maldives 1.31 Mali 7.13 Malta 5.32 Marshall Islands 1.6 Mauritania 3.14 Mauritius 3.05 Mexico 5.06 Moldova 3.31 Monaco 4.53 Mongolia 6.46 Montenegro 2.23 Morocco/Western Sahara 2.57 Mozambique 1.06 Myanmar (Burma) 4.45 Namibia 11.34 Nauru 1.8 Nepal 7.88 Netherlands 7.74 New Zealand 6.14 Nicaragua 2.12 Niger 0.54 Nigeria 7.05 Niue 4.64 North Macedonia 8.49 Norway 3.81 Oman 0.84 Pakistan 7.4 Palau 5.38 Panama 1.16 Papua New Guinea 4.47 Paraguay 3.99 Peru 2.31 Philippines 4.64 Poland 7.03 Portugal 2.46 Qatar 1.35 Venezuela 5.69 South Korea 4.9 Romania 5.26 Russia 2.99 Rwanda 3.54 Saint Kitts and Nevis 2.63 Saint Lucia 3.63 Saint Vincent and the Grenadines 5.12 Samoa 7.03 San Marino 3.35 São Tomé and Príncipe 4.59 Saudi Arabia 1.12 Senegal 6.26 Serbia/Kosovo 4.02 Seychelles 1.94 Sierra Leone 3.51 Singapore 6.18 Slovak Republic 6.94 Slovenia 3.33 Solomon Islands 5 South Africa 0.93 South Sudan 7.69 Spain 1.89 Sri Lanka 0.77 Sudan 3.33 Suriname 9.66 Sweden 4.27 Switzerland 1.94 Tajikistan 0.91 Tanzania 3.63 Thailand 3.98 Bahamas 1.62 Gambia 7.26 Timor-Leste 0.55 Togo 3.62 Tonga 3.32 Trinidad and Tobago 4.13 Tunisia 3.6 Türkiye 0.89 Turkmenistan 10.14 Tuvalu 1.05 Uganda 4.09 Ukraine 3.4 United Arab Emirates 10.35 United Kingdom 9.62 United States 6.93 Uruguay 3.03 Uzbekistan 1.21 Vanuatu 1.96 Vietnam 2.82 Zambia 0.91 Zimbabwe

About half the countries that met this 5-percent-of-GDP indicator were members of the OECD, a group of high-income countries. Together, these countries, which have some of the most developed health systems, spent an average of about 7.04 percent of GDP on health care from public sources in 2021, roughly double the global median at the height of the pandemic.

High-income countries were not the only ones that heavily invested in health care. Some of the countries that spent the most on health care through public means in 2021, as a share of GDP, were smaller island nations. Cuba, for example, reported spending the equivalent of 12.63 percent of GDP on health care in 2021.

While no low-income countries met this benchmark, six lower-middle income countries did: Kiribati (11.12 percent), Timor-Leste (7.26 percent), El Salvador (6.40 percent), Nicaragua (6.14 percent), Bolivia (5.88 percent), and Samoa (5.12 percent).

Benchmark 2: 15 Percent of National Budget

On average, a country’s national budget equates to about one-third of its GDP. If a country’s budget-to-GDP ratio is around this global average, 15 percent of its national budget will also be about 5 percent of GDP, the level of public investment discussed above that generally corresponds to better healthcare access and outcomes.

Only 47 countries spent more than 15 percent of their national budgets on health care in 2021, with the average around 11.22 percent. That means that 142 countries with about 6.3 billion people – or 82 percent of the total world’s population – did not reach that threshold.

However, if a government does not raise sufficient revenues to meet the global average budget-to-GDP ratio, it can spend 15 percent of its national budget on health care and still fall short of 5 percent of GDP. Comparing these two benchmarks can help identify countries that are demonstrating a commitment to funding health care through their national budgets but may have room to improve by increasing their revenues.

Only 10 Countries Spent More than 15 Percent of their National Budget on Health Care in 2021, But Not 5 Percent of GDP

Country

Public Healthcare Spending (%GDP)

Public Healthcare Spending

(% National Budget)

Size of National Budget

(%GDP)

Iran (Islamic Republic of)

3.19%

26.11%

12.21%

Singapore

3.51%

20.81%

No Data

Paraguay

4.47%

18.01%

24.80%

Dominican Republic

3.29%

17.74%

18.54%

Guatemala

2.33%

17.41%

13.53%

Peru

3.99%

16.94%

23.56%

Lebanon

2.90%

16.70%

9.13%

Cabo Verde

4.71%

15.75%

30.61%

Antigua and Barbuda

3.93%

15.54%

24.01%

South Africa

4.99%

15.29%

32.59%

These differences are most stark among countries in the African Union (AU), which made an explicit commitment to meet this 15-percent-of-budget benchmark in the 2001 Abuja Declaration. Twenty years later, only 2 of the AU’s 55 member countries spent more than 15 percent of their national budgets on health care: Cabo Verde (15.75 percent) and South Africa (15.29 percent). However, both fell short of meeting the 5 percent of GDP benchmark, although just barely, in the case of South Africa.

Public Healthcare Spending as Percent of General Government Expenditure in Africa, 2021 Twenty Years after the Abuja Declaration, Only Two Countries Met Spending Commitments. Domestic General Government Health Expenditure (GGHE-D) as % General Government Expenditure (GGE)

Source: World Health Organization, Global Health Expenditure Database (Domestic General Government Health Expenditure (GGHE-D) as % General Government Expenditure (GGE))

Data: Public Healthcare Spending as Percent of General Government Expenditure in Africa, 2021 Country percent Algeria 8.8% Angola 8.8% Benin 1.6% Botswana 14.6% Burkina Faso 9.8% Burundi 7.3% Cape Verde 15.7% Cameroon 2.8% Central African Republic 6.4% Chad 4.8% Comoros 4.7% Congo (Brazzaville) 8.2% Côte d'Ivoire 5% Democratic Republic of Congo 4.3% Djibouti 4.2% Egypt 6.7% Equatorial Guinea 5.3% Eritrea 2.3% Eswatini 12.3% Ethiopia 7% Gabon 9.5% Gambia 7.5% Ghana 8.2% Guinea-Bissau 4.6% Kenya 9.3% Lesotho 7.9% Liberia 3.7% Madagascar 5.3% Malawi 5.8% Mali 5% Mauritania 8.3% Mauritius 10.2% Morocco/Western Sahara 7.2% Mozambique 8.2% Namibia 11.2% Niger 8.7% Nigeria 4% Rwanda 9.5% São Tomé and Príncipe 13.1% Senegal 4.4% Seychelles 10.2% Sierra Leone 6.9% South Africa 15.3% South Sudan 2.1% Sudan 7.9% Togo 2.6% Tunisia 12.4% Uganda 4.9% Tanzania 5.1% Zambia 9.3% Zimbabwe 5.2%

While some other AU countries were not far off – notably Botswana (14.62 percent), São Tomé and Príncipe (13.14 percent), Tunisia (12.40 percent), and Eswatini (12.30 percent) – most countries in Africa were far from meeting this goal.

On the whole, countries in the AU spent an average of 7.35 percent of their national budgets on health care in 2021. Since 2000, the year before Abuja, the average allocation of public funds for health care in Africa has grown by only about 0.31 percentage points, or about one-third the global average over this period.

Retrogression in Public Healthcare Spending

The 20 years leading up to the Covid-19 pandemic were a period of growth in public healthcare spending. In 2000, the average country spent the equivalent of only 2.9 percent of GDP on health care through public means. By 2019, this had grown to 3.59 percent.

However, this growth in public healthcare spending was not equally distributed. The average for high-income countries crossed over the 5 percent of GDP threshold around 2008 and has stayed above this benchmark ever since. Public healthcare spending in low-income countries, meanwhile, essentially stagnated, only slightly growing at a rate about one-sixth the global average.

A Widening Gap: Low-Income Countries’ Public Healthcare Spending

These disparities and trends in healthcare spending are even clearer when using per-person data adjusted for purchasing power, that is, the amount of goods and services that this money can actually pay for. When data from different countries is equalized to adjust for differences in purchasing power, that metric is often referred to as purchasing power parity (PPP).

Using this approach, the average high-income country’s public healthcare spending per person has been worth more than double what is spent by the average country globally since 2000. Only upper-middle-income countries gained much ground over this period, with their income-group average rising to about one-half of the global average by 2021. Low-income countries, meanwhile, went from spending about 3.7 percent of the global average in 2000 to just 2.2 percent in 2021, a roughly 40 percent decline from already-low levels.

Between 2019 and 2020, public healthcare spending surged by about 0.51 percent of GDP, reflecting the exceptional circumstances of the pandemic. Much of this spending was allocated toward important but costly reactive needs like vaccines and personal protective equipment. But preliminary data from 2022 suggests that this pandemic-related increase in public healthcare spending was largely temporary.

Despite increased healthcare spending across the globe by 2021, 38 governments actually spent less on health care as a share of their GDP, than in the year before the pandemic began.

Economic decreases can hide real-term declines in public healthcare spending, for example, if spending as a percentage of GDP stays the same while a country’s GDP shrinks, hospitals and clinics can receive less funding while government spending appears to remain unchanged. At least six countries had net positive increases in their public healthcare spending as a share of GDP between 2019 and 2021 but decreased their per capita spending when measured in inflation-adjusted US dollars.

Inflation can also hide declines in real-term spending. For example, without adjusting for inflation, Lebanon had a roughly 23 percent decline in its per person public health spending between 2019 and 2021, falling from about 594,388 Lebanese pounds to 519,687. But when adjusted for inflation to constant 2021 values, this is actually a 78 percent real-term decline.

Overall, without adjusting for inflation, 24 governments spent less on health care per person in 2021 than they did in 2019. But when these expenditures are adjusted for inflation, this rises to 41 governments.

Going back further, without adjusting for inflation, only two governments spent less on health care per person in 2021 than they did in 2000: Benin (- 41 percent) and Vanuatu (-16 percent). But when adjusted for inflation into 2021 values, 16 countries reduced their per-person spending, with Madagascar, Benin, and Lebanon all experiencing roughly 62 percent declines.

Sixteen Countries Spent Less on Health Care Per Person in 2021 Than They Did in 2000

Country

2000 Per Capita Public Healthcare Spending (2021 National Currency)

2021 Per Capita Public Healthcare Spending (2021 National Currency)

Change (% Difference)

Madagascar

37,718

14,211

−62

Benin

6,308

2,399

−62

Lebanon

1,364,243

519,687

−62

Eritrea

181

−55

Vanuatu

8,681

4,017

−54

Haiti

1,342

631

−53

Central African Republic

5,964

3,319

−44

Tuvalu

1,221

724

−41

Chad

5,447

3,417

−37

Sudan

3,880

2,484

−36

Jordan

116

−35

Solomon Islands

736

596

−19

Papua New Guinea

132

108

−18

Brunei Darussalam

1,038

869

−16

Cameroon

4,866

4,482

−8

Marshall Islands

333

325

−2

World Health Organization, Global Health Expenditure Database (Domestic General Government Health Expenditure (GGHE-D), in current NCU per capita); inflation-adjusted to 2021 values using World Health Organization, Global Health Expenditure Database (Gross domestic product - Price index (2021=100).

While these spending changes before and during the pandemic may reflect differences in the healthcare needs of these countries’ populations, they may also reflect changing policy and practice that furthered or hindered the realization of the right to health.

Under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, any deliberately retrogressive policies, which can be reflected in decreasing funding allocated to health care, is presumptively a violation of the right to health unless it is fully justified.

Ultimately, what might fully justify such deliberately retrogressive measures is a matter of debate. But the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has made clear that the bar is quite high, as even the existence of an armed conflict alone is not sufficient to justify such measures.

The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights General Comment No. 7, providing authoritative normative guidance for interpreting and implementing African state obligations under the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights in the context of private provision of social services, articulates (para. 29) a clearer standard of what states must demonstrate to carry out deliberately retrogressive measures. Stating that such measures must (i) be temporary, (ii) pursue a legitimate aim, (iii) be necessary, (iv) be proportionate, (v) be nondiscriminatory, (vi) involve the full and effective participation of affected groups, and (vii) protect the core content of economic, social and cultural rights at all times.

The Impact of Insufficient Public Healthcare Spending on Out-Of-Pocket Costs

One way to estimate the impact of healthcare spending on people’s right to health is to look at how much people spend on health care from their personal income or savings: their out-of-pocket expenses. When governments don’t fund health care, individuals and households are left to shoulder the burden.

In 2021, households in 47 countries collectively paid more out-of-pocket for health care than their governments spent on it. In Nigeria, the largest economy in Africa in nominal GDP, households’ out-of-pocket health care costs were more than 4.7 times what the government spent. In India, the world’s fifth-largest economy, out-of-pocket costs were the majority of all health care spending that year.

These out-of-pocket expenses generally increase inequalities and create discriminatory barriers to health care based on income, widening gaps in quality of life and life expectancy. The cost of these user fees can also put other rights at risk, including public participation, housing, water, or education.

For example, the WHO’s 2010 World Health Report found that the incidence of financial catastrophe – that is, the proportion of people who spend more than 40 percent of their incomes after deducting expenses for food each year on out-of-pocket healthcare costs – only falls to “negligible levels” when out-of-pocket expenses constitute no more than 15 to 20 percent of a health systems’ total financing. But in 2021, at the height of the pandemic, out-of-pocket payments financed more than 20 percent of the healthcare system in 119 countries.

Only high-income countries averaged below this percent threshold (17.0 percent), while upper-middle (29.9 percent), lower-middle (34.6 percent), and low-income (39.1 percent) countries averaged far higher.

But there is an easy way to bring down healthcare systems’ reliance on out-of-pocket fees. Globally, there is a moderate, negative correlation between public healthcare spending and the share of healthcare costs paid by individuals and households. But this relationship is strongest among low-income countries, where increasing public spending appears to have a much stronger effect on lowering healthcare systems’ reliance on user fees.

Click to expand Image

Funding for Public Healthcare Expenditures

Many countries may find it difficult to garner the financial resources needed to shift their healthcare systems away from regressive user fees and toward a system grounded in universal access through public healthcare expenditures.

This is often especially true during financial crises. But increasing public spending during economic downturns (that is, “counter-cyclical spending”) has a “clear and well-documented effect on economic growth” and can prevent and manage crises, equalize opportunities, and maximize the realization of human rights, as outlined in guiding principlesadopted by the UN Human Rights Council in 2018, which were drafted by the UN independent expert on the effects of foreign debt.

However, whether a country can adopt such policies and adequately fund programs to mitigate the human rights effects of economic downturns may be influenced by many factors. Whether facing an acute crisis or not, governments can increase needed revenues by addressing external public debt, levying progressive taxes and stemming tax abuses, tackling public corruption, and securing external support from donor countries. Some of these require or will be more effective with international assistance and cooperation.

Public indebtedness appears to be a major impediment to governments’ investment in health care. According to the World Bank’s International Debt Statistics database, in 2021, 83 countries paid more per capita to service their external public and publicly guaranteed debts than on public healthcare expenditures. Benin, for example, paid nearly 26 times as much on foreign debts than on health care in 2021. Belize, which had the largest per capita debt servicing payment in 2021, spent more than 14 times as much on its foreign debt as health care on a per capita basis.

Another important consideration is a country’s revenue raising policies, particularly taxes. A 2016 report from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) suggests that tax revenues above 15 percent of GDP are key to reducing inequality. The World Bank has similarly used this 15 percent tax-to-GDP ratio to measure how much more money governments could raise to spend on social services.

Another reference point may be the average tax-to-GDP ratio among OECD countries, which was about 20 percent in 2021. Some nations with robust social welfare systems may even double these World Bank and IMF benchmarks, such as Denmark, which had a tax-to-GDP ratio of about 35 percent in 2021.

As it may be expected, when Human Rights Watch compared IMF tax-to-GDP data with the WHO’s healthcare spending data, there was a moderate, positive correlation between a country’s tax-to-GDP ratio and its public healthcare spending as a percent of their GDP. In short, states with a larger tax base relative to GDP generally spend more on health care, with low-income states showing the strongest relationship (Pearson Coefficient +0.74).

The IMF has only published 2021 tax-to-GDP ratio data for 107 countries. Of these, 34 countries spent less than the equivalent of 5 percent of their GDP on public healthcare spending and had tax-to-GDP ratios below the World Bank and IMF recommended 15 percent. This suggests that some of these countries may be able to improve funding for healthcare services.

Another way governments could increase their health funding is through addressing abuse of tax systems, both within and outside of their borders. For example, a 2023 report from the Tax Justice Network estimated that countries around the world are losing about US$480 billion each year to tax abuse: both illicit and licit means by which companies and people avoid and evade contributing to public coffers. The Tax Justice Network found that this lost revenue amounts to the equivalent of 9 percent of their collective public health budgets. But for lower-income countries, it amounts to the equivalent of 49 percent of their collective public health budgets. Shoring up tax enforcement can raise considerable public funds that can be allocated, among other priorities, to health care.

Data from 2021 suggests that many countries also relied on assistance from wealthier nations to support their healthcare systems. In 32 countries, donor governments and financial institutions paid for more than 25 percent of all healthcare spending.

Between 2020 and 2021, per capita healthcare spending from donors increased by about 60 percent. This equates to the second-largest increase in the past 20 years after 2003 to 2004.

Research from The Brookings Institution in 2022 found that, while official development assistance rose significantly during the pandemic, donor funds appeared to have been reallocated away from spending essential to health care to increase funds for pandemic preparedness and response.

Public corruption is another tremendous drain on the ability of many governments to fund health care. While estimates vary, it is clear that governments need to address it.

Moving Forward

The new data helps show that many healthcare systems around the world are not meeting international healthcare spending benchmarks that are helpful indicators of whether they are realizing the right to health.

It costs money to create and sustain robust public healthcare systems and to adequately regulate private providers to ensure their public service obligations to society are in line with human rights. But even amid a deadly pandemic, many governments’ policy and budgeting decisions resulted in healthcare financing models that indicate backward movement, inconsistent with their international human rights law obligations.

Funding alone is not enough. Cases like the United States show that an inefficient and expensive healthcare system may not deliver on the right to health despite significant public spending. Spending, however, is a necessary condition for delivering on the right to health.

The next months will provide an opportunity for all governments to renew their commitments to the realization of the right to health. Governments will convene to measure their progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals in April at the UN Economic and Social Council Forum on Financing for Development and in September for an ambitiously titled Summit of the Future. This builds on the UN High-Level Meeting on Universal Coverage that occurred in September 2023, where the representatives of nations all around the world reaffirmed their commitments to “scal[ing] up efforts to ensure nationally-appropriate spending targets for quality investments in public health.”

To realign their domestic financing and healthcare spending with their right to health obligations, states should:

Set a goal to spend through domestically-generated public funds the equivalent of at least 5 percent of GDP or 15 percent of general government expenditures on health care, or an amount that otherwise ensures the dedication of the maximum available resources for the realization of rights, including the right to health. Avoid reductions in funding for health care, unless under exceptional circumstances publicly justified, as outlined by the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Creditor governments and institutions should assess the impact of debt payments on the ability of governments to meet their human rights obligations and consider debt restructuring or relief where appropriate to ensure governments can adequately protect rights. Seek to increase public revenues for allocation to public health care through progressive taxes and changes to policy and enforcement to reduce tax abuses. Take steps to prevent and combat public corruption and strengthen international cooperation to realize human rights, in line with the 2021 Political Declaration adopted during the Special Session of the United Nations General Assembly Against Corruption.

Greek Court Deems Surveillance Powers Unconstitutional

Human Rights Watch — Wed, 10 Apr 2024 15:18:17 -0400

Greece’s highest administrative court, the Council of State, has declared unconstitutional a 2021 amendment that barred the Hellenic Authority for Communication Security and Privacy (ADAE), an independent body which oversees surveillance powers, from informing citizens of state surveillance on “national security” grounds.

Until March 2021, those under government surveillance could request information from ADAE about surveillance on them after the surveillance ended, provided disclosure didn’t jeopardize investigations. A March 2021 government-proposed change adopted by parliament removed the ability of ADAE to notify those surveilled, even after surveillance stopped.

The April 5 ruling found this change violated the Greek Constitution, the European Union Charter of Fundamental Rights, and the European Convention on Human Rights. This marks a major victory in Greece’s ongoing surveillance scandal which included revelations that the government surveilled independent journalists, business people, government officials, and opposition leader Nikos Androulakis.

Androulakis brought the landmark case after he discovered in 2022 the National Intelligence Service wiretapped his phone. In September 2022, his ADAE file request was denied based on the 2021 amendment. On April 8, following the Council of State’s decision, Androulakis again requested information from ADAE about his surveillance. The ruling should enable Androulakis and other targets of state surveillance falling under the March 2021 amendment to access information on their cases.

The Council of State found the blanket prohibition on informing individuals about their surveillance an “excessive restriction” on the right to privacy and a threat to the rule of law.

While the ruling doesn’t extend to a separate December 2022 law restricting ADAE’s powers, it’s a significant step. While the 2022 law is more permissive than its predecessor it still contains flaws. Greece’s government should listen to the court and enact reforms that fully guarantee the right to privacy and access to information for its citizens.

Thailand: Court Ruling Could Subvert Democratic Rule

Human Rights Watch — Wed, 10 Apr 2024 10:30:00 -0400

Click to expand Image Former leader of the Move Forward Party Pita Limjaroenrat, left, and the party's current leader Chaithawat Tulathon at a news conference at parliament in Bangkok, Thailand, January 31, 2024. © 2024 AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit

(Bangkok) – Thailand’s Constitutional Court will rule on a petition that could result in dissolving the country’s main opposition party and banning its leaders from politics, Human Rights Watch said today. The Move Forward Party (MFP), which won the largest number of seats in the May 2023 general elections, faces politically motivated allegations of high treason.

The Constitutional Court ruling, expected in the last week of April 2024, could have a serious impact on Thailand’s return to genuine democratic rule.

“From the start, the Thai Election Commission’s petition to the Constitutional Court against the Move Forward Party was a politicized battering ram,” said Elaine Pearson, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “It is crucial for the court to issue its ruling free from political pressure since it will have long-term implications for democracy in Thailand.”

On April 3, the Constitutional Court accepted a petition from Thailand’s Election Commission alleging that the MFP committed high treason by advocating reform of Penal Code section 112 on lèse-majesté (insulting the monarchy). The Election Commission contended that the Constitutional Court should dissolve the party and impose the maximum 10-year ban from politics on its executives under section 92 of the Act on Political Parties. The Election Commission filed its petition without allowing the party to counter the allegations.

The Constitutional Court should provide the Move Forward Party with the opportunity to present evidence and elaborate its defense in person, Human Rights Watch said. The court has given the party until April 18 to file its defense.

The Election Commission’s case is based on the Constitutional Court’s ruling on January 31 that the Move Forward Party’s campaign to amend the lèse-majesté law amounted to an attempt to abolish Thailand’s constitutional democracy with the king as head of state, contravening the constitution. Article 49 of Thailand’s constitution prohibits people from using their rights and freedoms to overthrow the monarchy.

In its January ruling, the Constitutional Court said that the MFP tried to either change or revoke section 112 on March 25, 2021, when its 44 members of parliament submitted a bill to amend the section. The court also ruled that party members in parliament gave tacit support to monarchy reform movements by taking part in civil society activities and providing bail guarantees to detained activists. The Constitutional Court held that such actions showed an intent to subvert the monarchy, which is “significantly dangerous to the security of the state.”

The Constitutional Court then ordered the MFP to cease its actions – including expressing opinions, speaking, writing, publishing, advertising, and conveying messages by any means – in pursuit of amending section 112. The party said that while it accepted the ruling, Thai society would lose an opportunity to use its parliamentary system to find solutions to conflicts. It reiterated that the party had no intention to overthrow the monarchy.

Disbanding the Move Forward Party would violate the rights of its members to freedom of expression, association, peaceful assembly, and democratic participation guaranteed under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which Thailand ratified in 1996.

Article 25 of the ICCPR ensures the right of citizens to participate in public affairs, and to vote and run for public office in free elections. The United Nations Human Rights Committee, the body of independent experts who review state compliance with the convention, has stated that this article protects the right to “join organizations and associations concerned with political and public affairs,” and that “political parties and membership in parties play a significant role in the conduct of public affairs.”

Eliminating the Move Forward Party would also seriously undermine Thailand’s efforts to fully restore democratic rule after years of military dictatorship. It would weaken checks-and-balances by the political opposition and unjustly cancel the votes of over 14 million supporters of the party.

Thailand’s allies and relevant UN agencies should publicly make clear that dissolving the party would severely affect Thailand’s standing as a generally rights-respecting country, Human Rights Watch said. Concerned governments should withdraw support for Thailand’s bid for the UN Human Rights Council for the 2025 to 2027 term if the MFP is dissolved.

“If a hugely popular political party that calls for reforms can be dissolved on specious grounds, the democratic rights of all Thais are at risk,” Pearson said. “Thailand’s allies should be clear that disbanding the Move Forward Party will damage the country’s efforts to achieve greater respect for human rights and democratic rule.”

Indian Court, Finding Lack of Evidence, Grants Bail to Activist

Human Rights Watch — Tue, 09 Apr 2024 23:30:00 -0400

Click to expand Image Activists demand justice for 84-year-old Father Stan Swamy, the Indian Jesuit priest and tribal rights activist, who had passed away earlier that month in New Delhi, July 23, 2021. © 2021 Mayank Makhija/NurPhoto via AP Photo

India’s Supreme Court on Friday granted bail to the activist Shoma Sen nearly six years after she was arrested in 2018 on politically motivated allegations of supporting a Maoist insurgency.

“We do not find prima facie commission or attempt to commit any terrorist act,” the judge said.

Sen is among 16 activists, lawyers, and academics arrested in relation to violence that broke out in Bhima Koregaon village in Maharashtra state in January 2018. One of them, the 84-year-old tribal rights activist Stan Swamy, died in detention in 2021.

They were held under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, the country’s counterterrorism law. Only five others have received bail, but the courts have repeatedly questioned the evidence against them. In the case of activist Anand Teltumbde, the Bombay High Court said in November 2022 that there was not enough evidence to conclude he had committed a terrorist act. The Supreme Court in July 2023 granted bail to activists Arun Ferreira and Vernon Gonsalves, saying the evidence did not support the case against them. While the trial has yet to begin, there are multiple reports that malware was used to plant false evidence on the laptops of Swamy and at least two other co-defendants.

In another particularly egregious case, the Bombay High Court in March acquitted academic GN Saibaba and five others who had been jailed since 2014 under the counterterrorism law for alleged links with banned Maoist organizations. Saibaba, who had polio and uses a wheelchair, alleged he was subjected to “inhumane treatment,” including being denied the use of his wheelchair in prison and refused proper medical care.

Indian authorities have also been accused of bias in investigations involving arrests of activists in cases related to the February 2020 violence in Delhi following peaceful protests against discriminatory citizenship policies. Police arrested 20 student leaders and activists, most of them Muslim, under the counterterrorism law. Six have been granted bail by various courts, which noted that the police failed to produce any evidence. In some cases, judges called the police investigations “shoddy” or “callous.”

Indian authorities should immediately drop the charges against these activists, stop the harassment and wrongful arrests of rights defenders, and amend the abusive counterterrorism law to bring it in line with international legal standards.

Myanmar: Military Forcibly Recruiting Rohingya

Human Rights Watch — Tue, 09 Apr 2024 21:00:00 -0400

(Bangkok) – The Myanmar military has abducted and forcibly recruited more than 1,000 Rohingya Muslim men and boys from across Rakhine State since February 2024, Human Rights Watch said today. The junta is using a conscription law that only applies to Myanmar citizens, although the Rohingya have long been denied citizenship under the 1982 Citizenship Law.

Rohingya described being picked up in nighttime raids, coerced with false promises of citizenship, and threatened with arrest, abduction, and beatings. The military has been sending Rohingya to abusive training for two weeks, then deploying them. Many have been sent to the front lines in the surging fighting between the junta and the Arakan Army armed group, which broke out in Rakhine State in November 2023, and a number have been killed and injured.

“It’s appalling to see Myanmar’s military, which has committed atrocities against the Rohingya for decades while denying them citizenship, now forcing them to fight on its behalf,” said Shayna Bauchner, Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The junta should immediately end this forced recruitment and permit Rohingya unlawfully conscripted to return home.”

Human Rights Watch documented 11 cases of forced recruitment, drawing on interviews with 25 Rohingya from Sittwe, Maungdaw, Buthidaung, Pauktaw, and Kyauktaw townships in Rakhine State and in Bangladesh.

On February 10, the military activated the 2010 People’s Military Service Law, enabling the conscription of men ages 18 to 35 and women ages 18 to 27 for up to five years during the current state of emergency. The announcement followed months of increased fighting with ethnic armed groups and resistance forces.

The junta announced that conscription would start in April, with a monthly quota of 5,000, but the authorities in Rakhine State began forcibly recruiting Rohingya in early February.

In late February, the military abducted over 150 Rohingya in raids on villages in Buthidaung township, according to people interviewed, Rohingya activists, and media reports. A 22-year-old Rohingya man said that light infantry battalion soldiers abducted him and 30 other young men and boys at gunpoint at about 11 p.m. on February 25 in Buthidaung town.

“The youngest boy taken away with us was 15 years old,” he said. “There were three recruits under 18 among us. After we were apprehended and taken to the military battalion, we saw the list of Rohingya who were going to be recruited. All the Rohingya youths in the region were included.”

Further raids took place in Maungdaw township in March. A 24-year-old Rohingya man who was abducted with about two dozen others from Ka Nyin Tan village said the officers told them, “Protecting Maungdaw is upon you.”

An estimated 630,000 Rohingya remain in Rakhine State under a system of apartheid and persecution, including about 150,000 held in open-air detention camps. Since the February 2021 military coup, the junta has imposed severe movement restrictions and aid blockages on the Rohingya, increasing their vulnerability to forced recruitment.

Rohingya camp management committee members said that junta authorities have been tallying “eligible” Rohingya or compelling the committees to make lists. Two members said when they tried to refuse, junta authorities further restricted movement in the camps and threatened mass arrests and ration cuts. “We had no other option,” one committee member said.

At meetings in camps in Sittwe and Kyaukpyu, junta officials promised to issue all forced recruits pink citizenship cards, reserved for “full” citizens. “In the meetings, officers picked up their citizenship cards and told people, ‘We will give you this type of ID card if you join the military service,’” a camp management committee member in Thet Kae Pyin camp said. “People believed them.” Authorities also promised 4,800 kyat (US$2.30) a day and two sacks of rice.

About 300 Rohingya from the Sittwe camps were sent to two weeks of military training in late February. Upon completion, the military gave the forced recruits 50,000 kyats ($24) but no citizenship cards. “When the junta broke their promise to issue citizenship cards to the first 300 Rohingya recruits, people stopped believing them and started avoiding the recruitment campaigns,” a camp management committee member said. Rohingya in the Sittwe camps said that for the second round of forced recruitment, the few hundred Rohingya were taken at gunpoint in raids.

Officials have also threatened to beat Rohingya to death if they refuse to join or to punish their families if they fled.

Many young Rohingya men have tried to escape Rakhine State or gone into hiding in the jungle to escape forced recruitment. The authorities rounded up and beat about 40 Rohingya from Kyauk Ta Lone camp when their family members ran away, according to Radio Free Asia.

The 22-year-old man described the military training as a brutal two-week period under constant harassment, with trainees forced to dig bunkers and split wood, with limited food and water. “We became weak within a few days,” he said. “Some recruits fell unconscious. Three of us were bleeding from our mouths and noses. The military officers used abusive language, called us ‘kalar’ [a slur for Muslims], and degraded our mothers and sisters. Those 12 days felt like 12 years of our lives.”

He witnessed numerous groups of forcibly recruited Rohingya arriving at the cantonment. He was ultimately able to escape, the only one from his ward to do so: “Of us 31, no one else has been released to this day.”

The forcible recruitment campaign has already resulted in casualties. After their training, 100 Rohingya from the Sittwe camps were sent to fight on the front lines in Rathedaung. Five were killed in fighting and 10 were seriously injured, one of whom later died, according to family members and camp leaders. The military authorities promised the families compensation of a million kyat ($476) and two sacks of rice. The five bodies have not been returned.

While 43 forced recruits later returned to the camps, there has been no news from the remainder. “We still don’t know their whereabouts,” a camp leader said. “We don’t know if they’re still alive.”

“They tricked my son into the military,” said the mother of a man who was killed. She said:

They took him to do electrical work, then forced him into the training. Now he’s dead because he was sent to war. They didn’t let us see the bodies. I couldn’t touch my son one last time. When he was taken away, his wife and I followed. He was held at a nearby cantonment for a few hours and we were able to talk to him from outside the fence. Then they were brought to a car. That was the last talk. He was crying.

Conscription without previous legal authorization is a form of arbitrary detention in violation of international human rights law, and the treatment of those forcibly recruited may amount to cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment. The Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict, which Myanmar ratified in September 2019, prohibits the forced recruitment, conscription, or use of anyone under 18 in armed conflict.

On March 18, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres expressed his concern about “reports of forcible detention and recruitment of youths, including Rohingya, and the potential impact of forced conscription on human rights and on the social fabric of communities in Myanmar.”

“The Myanmar military’s forced recruitment of Rohingya men and boys is its latest exploitation of a community made vulnerable to abuse by design, over decades of oppression,” Bauchner said. “Concerned governments should be strengthening avenues to justice to hold junta leaders accountable for their abuses, past and present.”

Texas Constructing Massive Anti-Migrant Military Base

Human Rights Watch — Tue, 09 Apr 2024 18:06:15 -0400

The Texas Military Department is constructing a massive new “Forward Operating Base” outside of the border community of Eagle Pass to house up to 1,800 national guard members. The base is part of the state’s multibillion-dollar anti-migrant program, Operation Lone Star.

Satellite imagery of the site examined by Human Rights Watch shows the massive clearing of land. A video I shot earlier this month shows numerous construction vehicles at the site.

The base could cost Texas taxpayers up to $400 million by September 2026, according to the Austin American-Statesman, and will include an armory and capacity that can be “surged” to accommodate 2,300 troop members.

It is the latest component of the dragnet of laws and initiatives under Operation Lone Star, a ballooning program that Texas Governor Greg Abbott touts as an effort to curtail cartel activities and to reduce unauthorized migration and drug smuggling at the Texas-Mexico border.

While there is no evidence Operation Lone Star has slowed migration, the program has led to injuries and deaths, including in high-speed vehicle chases that Human Rights Watch has investigated. Operation Lone Star has consistently led to violations of the rights of migrants and US citizens, including attacks on freedoms of association and expression of groups providing support to migrants in Texas.

Eagle Pass residents have increasingly grown weary of the program.

In January, three migrants, two of them children, drowned in the Rio Grande near Shelby Park in Eagle Pass. Days earlier, Texas officials had seized the park, against the city’s wishes, and prohibited federal agents from accessing the park. This impeded rescue operations. The drownings and park seizure followed a statement by Texas Governor Greg Abbott during a radio interview where he said the “only thing we're not doing is shooting people” because “the Biden Administration would charge us with murder.”

Amerika Garcia Grewal, a leader of the Eagle Pass Border Coalition, a community organization working for a positive vision of the border, told Human Rights Watch that the construction of the military base didn’t account for the needs of local community members. “It’s disheartening to see this significant sum of Texas tax dollars funneled into the construction of a military base when it could be invested in the future of our children and the health of our community,” Garcia Grewal said.

Instead of wasting hundreds of millions more on border militarization, Texas should work to create a humane system that respects and welcomes migrants and builds strong, resilient border communities.