Daily Brief Audio Series

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the fight of the century – the battle of our lives – here in the sold-out EU arena in Brussels.

In this corner, wearing a confident look that only money can buy, big business bosses seeking to maximize profits.

And in the other corner, wearing a determined if exasperated expression, a rag-tag coalition of people wanting to live on a habitable planet.

OK, sorry, that’s a bit dramatic – and full of terrible clichés besides. But it’s actually not too far off what’s happening in the European capital right now.

Industry groups from Europe and the US are trying to weaken the European Union’s flagship corporate accountability law and its measures tackling climate change.

The 2024 EU law is called the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive. It requires large companies operating in the EU to identify and address human rights and environmental harms in their operations and supply chains.

The climate provisions of the Directive require companies covered by the law to adopt and put into effect a “transition plan for climate change mitigation” in line with the Paris Agreement. That is, it has to be consistent with limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

As quick reminder: burning fossil fuels is the primary driver of global warming. It accounts for about two thirds of annual global greenhouse gas emissions. The production of fossil fuels is also linked to severe human rights and environmental harms, including toxic air, unsafe water, and polluted ecosystems.

European and US fossil fuel companies have particularly targeted these climate provisions in the law.

Lobbying by European and US companies and groups, including the American Chamber of Commerce to the EU, has heavily influenced the European Commission’s “Omnibus proposal” to substantially weaken key points of the law that would make it harder for victims of rights abuses to sue companies.

On June 27, ExxonMobil Chief Executive Darren Woods asked US President Donald Trump to address the law as part of trade negotiations with the EU. ExxonMobil has met with senior European Commission officials at least five times since the beginning of 2025 to discuss the law or related topics.

So, here we all are: the fight of the century. The next round of the bout will take place in the European Parliament, where the fate of the EU’s corporate accountability law now rests.

Will parliamentarians succumb to lobbying by powerful industries?

Or will they fight for a law that requires companies to take robust action against climate change and that holds corporations to account for human rights and environmental abuses worldwide?

Stay tuned…

The most recent global education figures make for grim reading.

Nearly 200 million children and youth are missing out on secondary school. Another 72 million kids who should be in primary school are not.

Compared with 2023, this represents an estimated increase of 21 million more children out of school. That’s a staggering shift backwards in just two years.

But even these stark numbers understate the global crisis. They don’t take into account kids in areas of armed conflict, like Gaza and Sudan. That would add 13 million children, bringing the total out-of-school population closer to 285 million.

And global education exclusion rates are, in fact, higher still when you count preschool. There are some 175 million unenrolled preschool-aged children, who are not benefiting from all-important early childhood education.

The total numbers are dizzying: hundreds of millions of children are not in education as they should be. The negative impact on individual lives – not to mention on the future of humanity generally – is impossible to calculate.

Some of the reason for the recent increase in out-of-school kids is down to funding cuts, often as part of regressive austerity measures. Simply put, governments’ financing decisions deprioritizing education are making things worse.

Recent cuts to international aid will no doubt compound the problem in many countries.

Education is a right, and governments are obligated to uphold that right. They should be protecting public education budgets to create access to free, quality public education for all.

There is an internationally agreed benchmark for government spending on education, by the way. It’s at least 4 to 6 percent of gross domestic product and/or at least 15 to 20 percent of total public expenditure. That doesn’t seem unreasonable, considering it’s an investment in the country’s future.

Last week in Sevilla, Spain, governments gathered at the 4th International Conference on Financing for Development. There they signed a pledge to “support adequate financing to ensure inclusive, equitable, and quality education for all.”

It’s a welcome promise. Now, to deal with the global education crisis, they need to put it into action.

Abusive governments are always pushing back against human rights groups. It’s an uneven fight, of course. Governments have power. Human rights defenders are underdogs, armed only with research, the law, and perhaps a bullhorn.

But sometimes, we win.

To get to today’s story, however, we should start at the beginning, in Eritrea.

Eritrea has one of the worst human rights records in the world. The UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Eritrea gave a detailed report to the UN Human Rights Council last month. It described serious ongoing abuses.

Arbitrary detentions and enforced disappearances are widespread and systematic. Freedom of religion is severely restricted. The government also has a policy of indefinite national service, including compulsory military conscription. This means most Eritreans spend their lives in government service.

Ten years ago, the UN Commission of Inquiry on Eritrea concluded, “systematic, widespread and gross human rights violations […] committed in Eritrea under the authority of the Government […] may constitute crimes against humanity.”

In his report last month, the UN special rapporteur highlighted the lack of progress on accountability a decade after that conclusion. In short, the government continues its abuses, and no one is held responsible for appalling crimes.

Instead, the government of Eritrea has attacked the messengers. In recent months in particular, they have made an aggressive diplomatic push to get rid of the UN special rapporteur. The government’s effort culminated in a vote at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on Friday to end the rapporteur’s mandate.

Rights groups urged concerned governments to defend continued international scrutiny of the desperate human rights situation in Eritrea. We worked with Eritrean and international rights groups to press the Council to keep the UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Eritrea.

In the end, human rights defenders won. Council members decisively voted down the Eritrean government’s resolution and instead renewed the UN special rapporteur’s mandate for another year.

In fact, Friday’s vote at the UN Human Rights Council was a resounding victory. Only four states – China, Cuba, Bolivia, and Sudan – backed the Eritrean government. Twenty-five states voted against it.

The work of the UN special rapporteur will continue.

Of course, this victory will not improve anyone’s situation in Eritrea overnight. Extreme repression won’t end with the government’s embarrassing diplomatic defeat in Geneva.

But it does maintain international pressure on the government of Eritrea. And most importantly, it’s a recognition of global concern for – and solidarity with – that government’s many victims.

Children should be able to go to school and learn without fear. Authorities should ensure these basic rights.

For girls in South Sudan, this is harrowingly not the case, as a few recent examples make clear.

On June 25, armed men in Pochalla North, Jonglei state reportedly abducted four female students as they travelled to sit for secondary school exams. The local community have organized search efforts, but the four remain missing.

The same month, police said they had arrested seven suspects in the gang-rape of a 16-year-old girl in South Sudan’s capital, Juba. An alleged video of the attack spread online, generating public outrage.

In May, armed youth surrounded a girls’ boarding school in Marial Lou, Warrap state, trapping at least 100 students inside. The United Nations peacekeeping mission had to negotiate an end to the siege.

These incidents are part of an all-too-familiar story in South Sudan where a girl’s body, her education, and her future are under constant threat.

Generations of conflict, widespread access to arms, and patriarchal customs have long turned women’s and girls’ bodies into battlegrounds. As HRW expert Nyagoah Tut Pur says, they are used as spoils of war or bargaining chips in intercommunal disputes.

The encouraging part of this is that South Sudanese communities are mobilizing to protect girls. Activists are organizing public forums to encourage survivors to speak out.

This gives hope such behavior and practices may change.

However, meaningful protection still depends on authorities ensuring accountability for perpetrators. Currently, convictions are rare in cases of attacks on women and girls.

The state needs to fulfil its legal obligations to protect women and girls. South Sudan has signed up to numerous international treaties that are relevant here. These include the Convention on Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the Safe Schools Declaration.

Going forward, the Ministry of Gender, Child and Social Welfare and the Ministry of Justice have promoted the Anti-Gender Based Violence and Child Protection Bill. This could strengthen legal protections, criminalize forced and child marriage, and guarantee survivors free medical and psychosocial support. Parliament should prioritize the bill’s adoption.

Girls in South Sudan should be able to go to school and learn without fear. It’s ultimately on the government to make that “should” a reality.