“EU ‘caving into the floodgates of anti-migrant rhetoric’ warns Human Rights Watch”, @philippedam.bsky.social and I speak to @euobserver.com about migration fixation warping EU foreign policy and eroding asylum rights at home euobserver.com/201254/eu-ca...

How Europe Dies

1/n Today @hrw.org publishes its World Report 2026. The full text, the introductory essay, and individual chapters can be accessed here: www.hrw.org/world-report... What follows below in this thread are links to relevant parts on Europe, produced by the team of which I am part. #Rights2026

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe today called on member states to adopt legislation to “prohibit conversion practices, providing for criminal sanctions and based on a clear and comprehensive definition of the proscribed practices”. pace.coe.int/en/news/1018...

The Greek Parliament should reject measures in a new immigration bill that explicitly link civil society groups & humanitarian workers with criminal conduct, when in reality they are simply helping people in distress trying to reach Greece, @hrw.org says www.hrw.org/news/2026/01...

"They left the building. Not the truth." A powerful new documentary, 80 Angry Journalists, shows how Hungary’s once-independent news outlet Index was taken over, and how reporters resigned together rather than submit to political pressure. Trailer⤵️

The killing of Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis offers a stark warning to the UK government of the dangers of treating civic action as a security threat rather than as a fundamental right & cornerstone of democracy, @yasmineahmed.bsky.social & @lydsg.bsky.social explain www.hrw.org/news/2026/01...

The trial of 6 Italian officers for a 2023 shipwreck in which at least 94 people died is an important opportunity for justice for deaths of migrants and asylum seekers at sea, @hrw.org says www.hrw.org/news/2026/01...

In Hungary, almost half a million older people receive pensions that leave them living below the poverty line. In a new report, HRW shows how the Hungarian government is failing to ensure older people’s rights to social security and an adequate standard of living. Read more: https://bit.ly/4jBH4VG

New @hrw.org research out tomorrow on inadequate pensions and older people experiencing poverty in Hungary 🇭🇺 - interview testimony from older people 👵🏻👴🏻 - difficulties affording food 🍞🥩🍓☕, gas/electricity 🔌💡, medical supplies 💊🤕 - lots of graphs and charts 📊〽️ Media queries to @kooyjan.bsky.social

When protest is criminalized, democracy weakens. My @theguardian.com op-ed on why UK protest laws should worry us all. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Freedom of assembly is not a gift or privilege governments grant their citizens, it's a right that protects citizens from their governments. @hrw.org report out today about the impact of the UK's increasingly repressive anti-protest laws. www.hrw.org/news/2026/01...

UK authorities are severely restricting the right to protest, in breach of human rights obligations, creating an climate in which peaceful dissent is increasingly treated as a criminal act and the fabric of democracy is undermined, new @hrw.org research finds www.hrw.org/news/2026/01...

🚨Going out on Thursday January 8: "Silencing the Streets’: The Right to Protest Under Attack in the UK”. New, 47-page report @hrw.org. Reporters can DM me for access to embargoed report, interview requests etc.

In Memory of Gyula Balog (1959-2025), an inspiring housing rights and anti-poverty activist Here is a brief reflection on behalf of @hrw.org to express our condolences, as Gyula’s friends and colleagues lay him to rest today in Budapest. Rest in power, Gyula bacsi! www.hrw.org/news/2025/12...

Truly shocking from a party in government that previously introduced the Human Rights Act. Then it was “bringing rights home“ Now it is apparently about sending them away. We will all pay the price for this folly.

As European leaders meet to discuss the European Convention on Human Rights, here's a reminder that efforts to weaken the Convention and Court to serve the interests of states on migration will undermine the rights of everyone in the Council of Europe region www.hrw.org/news/2025/09...

A new @europarl.europa.eu “Scrutiny Working Group” on funding for NGOs is painted as an effort to boost transparency. But its superfluous mandate, narrow focus and biased composition suggest the real aim is to silence and stigmatize civil society, @hrw.org says www.hrw.org/news/2025/12...

Russia’s banning of @hrw.org as an “undesirable” foreign organization, made public today, is yet another mark of the Kremlin’s repression. It only redoubles our determination to document the Russian authorities’ human rights violations and war crimes www.hrw.org/news/2025/11...

"A political deal that erases these crimes is not a peace plan. It is permission for future atrocities." - Kseniya Kvitka (@hrw.org), in must-read, published by @kyivindependent.com⤵️

Good riddance to rubbish policy. The end to the UK's "two child limit" social security policy has been announced, and it will soon be gone. We @hrw.org welcome the news, as one of many, many, many voices calling for an end to this arbitrary, cruel social security policy.

🚨 New from @hrw.org: UN leadership & member states should preserve the UN's long underfunded human rights pillar Independent mechanisms responding to grave crises need to be saved. Cutting or merging them won't solve the UN's funding crisis caused by US, #China & others not paying their dues.

RIP Jimmy Cliff Thank you for the incredible music www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmc5...

Bad politics as well as bad policy…

Oped by @yasmineahmed.bsky.social on UK govt's immigration plans: "We've seen the injustices caused by a hostile environment with the Windrush generation. Instead of learning from that shameful chapter, these proposals risk recreating the same architecture of precarity" www.hrw.org/news/2025/11...

We’re thrilled to share that Human Rights Watch’s #WithHumanity campaign has been selected as a Gold award winner at the Anthem Awards. 🙌 www.anthemawards.com/winners/list...

France is failing to provide education to all children in the French overseas department of Mayotte , @hrw.org research finds. The French government’s neglect of Mayotte is an ongoing legacy of colonialism that has left the island persistently underdeveloped www.hrw.org/news/2025/11...

This is now a familiar rubric for ideas that are hard to sell on merits. 2019: Boris Johnson’s agenda is the only way to stop Nigel Farage’s. 2024: Nigel Farage’s agenda is the only way to stop Tommy Robinson. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Among the many things wrong with Labour’s immigration strategy, this stands out: to “fight” a few thousand so-called illegal migrants, Shabana Mahmood is willing to make life hell for hundreds of thousands of people who are legally in the UK. 🔗 theconversation.com/labours-plan...

REMINDER: The European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) keeps us all safe and free. Every. Single. Day.

Happening Now!

Today & tmrw, European Parliament will adopt its 1st report calling on EU & members to step up response to attacks & harassment by autocratic Govts against their nationals beyond their borders. #TransnationalRepression is a major threat to freedoms in the EU. www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/agen...

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In Hungary, Pastor Gábor Iványi, whose church supports people in poverty, faces absurd charges. The pastor and his church are human rights defenders providing shelter, food, education to people left behind by the state. The move is part of a wider crackdown on dissent. www.hrw.org/news/2025/11...

As we celebrate 75 years of the European Convention on Human Rights, some politicians want to weaken the court that enforces its protections and water down the convention itself. We should resist these efforts which would undermine rights for everyone #ECHR75 www.hrw.org/news/2025/09...

We @hrw.org are glad to be able to support this initiative led by @bigissue.com calling on the UK government to set child poverty reduction targets. www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

"It’s a question of humanity": How a small Spanish town led by a conservative mayor voted unanimously to regularise undocumented migrant workers A different way is possible... H/T @picumofficial.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/world/2025/o...

A draft law in Türkiye would pave the way for criminal charges against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in one of the most alarming rollbacks of rights in decades, @hrw.org says. The proposal should be immediately withdrawn www.hrw.org/news/2025/10...

This photo by Don McCullin of a protestor - taken in 1962 at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis - resonates strongly today...

A win for Windrush campaigners: Private pension losses will now be compensated under the #Windrush Compensation Scheme--important considering the age of claimants. BUT without free legal representation, access to compensation is hampered. www.hrw.org/news/2025/10... @hrw.org

They are PEOPLE before anything else.

Returning colonial-era cultural belongings & ancestral remains is an international human rights & reparations issue. Communities' rights should be at the core. Yet Germany's new guidelines distance themselves from international law. Returns aren't goodwill gestures. www.hrw.org/news/2025/10...

EU Parliament lawmakers from four political groups wrote a letter to the Commission urging an end to funding for all Libyan security forces. They condemn what they call the violent actions of the Libyan Coast Guard against humanitarian vessels in the Mediterranean. ➡️ https://l.euronews.com/kQ2V

Glad to see this report by @deschuttero.bsky.social is out. The links between states scaling back programs that protect social rights, people’s disillusionment with the establishment, and the draw of the far right, are all too evident in many European countries. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/o...

Our #WithHumanity campaign calling on the EU to save lives of people seeking safety or a better life is a finalist at the Anthem Awards! 🤝🙌 You can amplify the call with a vote for #WithHumanity for the Community Voice Award before Oct 30! 🗳️ https://wbby.co/HCAWNP

When govts convene this week in Paris to discuss feminist foreign policy, there will be a lot to talk about. The French govt’s description of the event says progress toward gender equality “is not being made fast enough.” That is an epic understatement. www.hrw.org/news/2025/10...

The EU’s LGBTIQ+ Equality Strategy 2026–2030 reaffirms that equality and democracy are inseparable. The EU and its member states should now back their words with concrete action—political, legal, and financial—both at home and abroad. 📄 @hrw.org : www.hrw.org/news/2025/10...

The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child finds France responsible for grave and systematic violations of the rights of unaccompanied migrant children www.ohchr.org/en/press-rel...

The next Article 7 hearing in respect of Hungary will be held on 21 October in the General Affairs Council. 9 Hungarian civil society organisations outlined key developments, priority concerns, and recommendations on 13 topics under scrutiny. Our new paper: helsinki.hu/en/wp-conten...