ARTICLE 19 commends the Special Rapporteur for her report, which reminds us of the courage of human rights defenders worldwide amid detrimental attacks on civic space.
Across the world, human rights defenders face extreme threats for their work – from killings, to physical abuse, to surveillance – underpinned by increasingly repressive laws. The rise of transnational repression is having existential impacts, leaving many human rights defenders and their families without refuge from the grip of repressive regimes.
These wholesale attacks on human rights defenders now coincide with cataclysmic funding cuts to the human rights ecosystem. These cuts were first instigated by the United States, and now many other governments worldwide are also making cuts.
As ARTICLE 19’s upcoming report on the impact of the US cuts shows, the consequences for civil society have been immediate and immense. Mass uncertainty. Widespread job losses. The shuttering of critical programmes, organisations, and initiatives – many built up over decades. In particular, the cuts have decimated large swathes of global efforts to defend freedom of expression, and the impact on protection work means the world is a more dangerous place for human rights defenders than it was a year ago.
The cuts have also hugely curtailed diversity and representation in policymaking fora, especially for marginalised groups, and have severely weakened civil society’s ability to carry out its vital role of providing checks and balances on government and corporate power.
Despite these challenges, human rights defenders continue to have faith in the multilateral system. As the Special Rapporteur notes, it ‘anchors their work and provides them with a moral compass’.
States must now not only actively demonstrate their commitment to the multilateral human rights system, but ensure that it is more credible, inclusive, and responsive to the demands of human rights defenders worldwide. As part of these efforts, they must urgently fund work to protect human rights defenders, including more predictable and flexible core funding that allows civil society to rebuild, reinvent, and reconfigure to meet the challenges of our time. They should also allocate specific funding to support diverse representation in policy and decision making fora.
Special Rapporteur, ARTICLE 19 takes this opportunity to thank you for your invaluable contributions to the protection of human rights defenders over the past six years.