Reports

The 50-page report, “The Air is Unbearable: Health Impacts of Deforestation-Related Fires in the Brazilian Amazon,” uses official health and environmental data to estimate that 2,195 hospitalizations due to respiratory illness are attributable to the 2019 fires.

This report documents that investment banks owned by Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom are failing to protect the rights of people working and living on three plantations they finance. Human Rights Watch found that Feronia and its subsidiary in Congo, Plantations et Huileries du Congo, S.A.

This report provides an overview of the legal framework behind the human right to water and recommendations on how to work with government officials and other towards the realization of this right.

This report documents how illegal logging by criminal networks and resulting forest fires are connected to acts of violence and intimidation against forest defenders and the state’s failure to investigate and prosecute these crimes. 

This report examines the effects of lead contamination in Kabwe, a provincial capital, on children’s rights to health, a healthy environment, education, and play.

The 73-page report “‘We Know Our Lives Are in Danger’: Environment of Fear in South Africa’s Mining-affected Communities” and video cites activists’ reports of intimidation, violence, damage to property, use of excessive force during peaceful protests, and arbitrary arrest for their activities in highlighting the

This report describes the context for activism around The Lamu Port-South Sudan-Ethiopia Transport corridor project (LAPSSET) and associated development projects, and documents the obstacles activists face in speaking out publicly about their concerns.

This report finds that Congress failed to mitigate health risks associated with this form of mining when it voted to roll back a modest regulation to protect streams from mining pollution.

This report focuses on two mining projects that were Guinea’s two largest bauxite producers in 2017: La Société Minière de Boké (SMB), a joint venture linked to the world’s largest aluminum producer, China Hongqiao Group, that has expanded extremely rapidly since it began in 2015; and la Compagnie des Bauxites de Guinée

This report documents cases of acute poisoning from pesticide drift in seven sites, located across Brazil, including farming communities, indigenous communities, quilombo (Afro-Brazilian) communities, and rural schools.

This report shows that prosecutors in three prominent cases failed to produce sufficient evidence to support serious charges or justify the years-long continuation of a criminal investigation.

This report describes how migrant fishers from neighboring countries in Southeast Asia are often trafficked into fishing work, prevented from changing employers, not paid on time, and paid below the minimum wage.

This report finds that Lebanese authorities’ lack of effective action to address widespread open burning of waste and a lack of adequate monitoring or information about the health effects violate Lebanon’s obligations under international law.

This report examines the impact of commercial farms on residents’ rights to health, housing, livelihood, food and water security, and education. It examines how women have been disproportionately affected and often excluded from negotiations with commercial farmers.

This report documents human rights violations by militias, police, and government officials in Karen State for the confiscation of land from ethnic Karen farmers, many of whose families had farmed the land for generations.