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  • The Mediterranean Migration Crisis

    Why People Flee, What the EU Should Do

    The 33-page report documents the human rights abuses driving people to make the dangerous sea crossing and the shortcomings of EU migration and asylum policies. The report is based on over 150 interviews in May with recently-arrived migrants and asylum seekers in Italy – Lampedusa, Catania, and Milan – and Greece – the islands of Lesbos, Chios, Samos, Leros, and Kos. The conclusions are also based on extensive Human Rights Watch research in Syria, Eritrea, Afghanistan, and Somalia – the home countries of many of those arriving by sea.

  • Shattered Dreams

    Impact of Spain’s Housing Crisis on Vulnerable Groups

    This 81-page report documents the hardships faced by families who lose their homes after defaulting on mortgage payments amid Spain’s economic recession and massive unemployment. The report is based on in-depth interviews with 44 women and men who have experienced or were facing eviction, civil society organizations, and government officials.

  • Eternal Emergency

    No End to Unaccompanied Migrant Children’s Institutionalization in Canary Islands Emergency Centers

    This 40-page report says that the centers fail to comply with the Canary Islands government's minimum care standards for migrant children and have no occupancy limits. The approximately 100 children in the biggest and most secluded emergency center, La Esperanza, receive low-quality food, lack adequate heating, hot water, and blankets, and report frequent violence from other children.

  • Returns at Any Cost

    Spain’s Push to Repatriate Unaccompanied Children in the Absence of Safeguards

    This 22-page report says that in Andalusia, the southern region that is a common entry point for migrants, authorities have said they intend to send up to 1,000 unaccompanied children in their custody to Morocco, claiming that safeguards are in place. But officials could not explain how they determined it was in a child’s best interest to return, as required by law.

  • Unwelcome Responsibilities

    Spain’s Failure to Protect the Rights of Unaccompanied Migrant Children in the Canary Islands

    This 115-page report documents how children stay in emergency centers for indefinite periods, in often overcrowded and poor conditions. The children told Human Rights Watch that they have been subjected to beatings by staff, and left unprotected from violence by their peers.

  • Setting an Example?

    Counter-Terrorism Measures in Spain

    This 65-page report analyzes aspects of Spain’s criminal law and procedures that fall short of its commitments under international human rights law. Problematic practices include the use of incommunicado detention and secret legal proceedings, limitations on the right to a lawyer during the initial period of detention, and lengthy periods of pre-trial detention.

  • In the Name of Counter-Terrorism: Human Rights Abuses Worldwide

    A Human Rights Watch Briefing Paper for the 59th Session of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights

    This paper first surveys initiatives taken by U.N., regional, and other intergovernmental bodies in the context of the international campaign against terrorism.

  • Discretion Without Bounds

    The Arbitrary Application of Spanish Immigration Law

    The Human Rights Watch report, "Discretion Without Bounds: The Arbitrary Implementation of Spanish Immigration Law," criticizes the Spanish authorities' uncoordinated and ad hoc application of Spanish Law 8/2000.

  • Nowhere To Turn

    State Abuses of Unaccompanied Migrant Children by Spain and Morocco

    Moroccan migrant children in Spain are frequently beaten by police and abused by staff and other children in overcrowded, unsanitary residential centers, Human Rights Watch charged in this report. Spain also summarily expels children as young as eleven to Morocco, where Moroccan policebeat and ill-treat them and then abandon them to the streets.

  • The Other Face Of The Canary Islands

    Rights Violations Against Migrants and Asylum Seekers

    The government of Spain is violating the rights of migrants and asylum seekers who arrive illegally on Spanish shores, Human Rights Watch said in a new report released today.

  • Prison Conditions in Spain

    Helsinki Watch urges the Spanish government to end its secretive policy with respect to prisons and describes problems ranging from overcrowding and periodic violence to forced idleness for inmates and very limited visiting privileges for a significant group of prisoners.