Reports

The 94-page report “Dismantling Detention: International Alternatives to Detaining Immigrants,” examines alternatives to detention in six countries: Bulgaria, Cyprus, Spain, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States. Human Rights Watch found that alternatives to detention such as case management services, can effectively address government interests in immigration enforcement while protecting migrants’ rights and often offering a range of other benefits.

The 82-page report, “‘Worth Less Than an Animal’: Abuses and Due Process Violations in Pretrial Detention in North Korea,” provides a unique and detailed description of the country’s opaque criminal justice system. It highlights North Korea’s weak legal and institutional framework, and the political nature of the courts and law enforcement agencies under the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea.

This report details how military, police and auxiliary security units, sometimes with the assistance of local civilian authorities, apprehended suspected petty offenders and summarily executed them. Two men were killed by civilians after local authorities encouraged residents to kill thieves. In all the cases Human Rights Watch documented, the victims were killed without any effort at due process to establish their guilt or bring them to justice, and none posed any imminent threat to life that could have otherwise justified the use of lethal force against them.
 

This report found that at least 90 people were victims of enforced disappearance in 2016 alone. While most were produced in court after weeks or months of secret detention, Human Rights Watch documented 21 cases of detainees who were later killed, and nine others whose whereabouts remain unknown. 

This report examines police disregard for arrest regulations, custodial deaths from torture, and impunity for those responsible. It draws on in-depth investigations into 17 deaths in custody that occurred between 2009 and 2015, including more than 70 interviews with victims’ family members, witnesses, justice experts, and police officials. In each of the 17 cases, the police did not follow proper arrest procedures, making the suspect more vulnerable to abuse.

This report documents how the weakening of safeguards through decrees adopted under the state of emergency has negatively affected police detention conditions and the rights of detainees. It details 13 cases of alleged abuse, including stress positions, sleep deprivation, severe beatings, sexual abuse, and rape threats, since the coup attempt.

This report calls upon Bangladesh authorities to order prompt, impartial, and independent investigations into all alleged “kneecappings” and other deliberate infliction of serious injuries by members of the security forces. The government should also invite the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and UN special rapporteurs on torture and extrajudicial executions to investigate “kneecappings” and other alleged acts of torture and make appropriate recommendations to ensure justice, accountability, and security force reform.

This report documents a range of human rights violations committed by police, including arbitrary arrest and detention, torture, and extrajudicial killings. Human Rights Watch also found that provincial police forces face improper pressure from politicians and local elites, a dearth of ethical and professional standards, and increasing demands and public expectations.

This report shows how changing patterns of unrest and politicized detentions, prosecutions, and convictions from 2013-2015 correlate with the latest phase of the government’s “stability maintenance” campaign – a policy that has resulted in unprecedented surveillance and control in Tibetan villages and towns.

The report, “‘We Feel We Are Cursed’: Life under ISIS in Sirte, Libya,” also finds that ISIS is inflicting severe hardship on the local population by diverting food, medicine, fuel, and cash, along with homes it seized from residents who fled, to fighters and functionaries it has amassed in the Mediterranean port city. As the de facto government in Sirte, ISIS has the duty to ensure that all residents are able to exercise their basic human rights, including the rights to food and health.

This 73-page report details the brutal crackdown that followed a series of violent attacks on military installations around the country in August. The attacks were allegedly committed by militants loyal to former President Laurent Gbagbo.

The 112-page report says that while terrorist attacks have caused thousands of deaths and injuries, that is no justification for counterterrorism laws that violate the basic rights of suspects and that are also used for politically motivated purposes.

In September 2001, President Isaias Afewerki of Eritrea ordered the detention of 21 senior government members and journalists who criticized him and his government. Since then, Isaias has closed all independent media outlets and turned Eritrea into a country where arbitrary arrest, torture, disappearance, and death are rife and where it is almost impossible to leave.

This 107-page report presents substantial information warranting criminal investigations of Bush and senior administration officials, including former Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and CIA Director George Tenet, for ordering practices such as “waterboarding,” the use of secret CIA prisons, and the transfer of detainees to countries where they were tortured.