Guterres stressed that this assault is not coming from the shadows or by surprise. It is happening in plain sight and often led by those who hold the greatest power. He did not mention specific situations although he did voice outrage at Russia's war in Ukraine, where he said more than 15,000 civilians had been killed in four years of violence. It is more than past time to end the bloodshed, he said.
As fears loomed of renewed conflict after Washington carried out a major redeployment of military assets to the region, the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said he thought there was still a good chance of finding a diplomatic solution. He told CBS negotiators would probably meet on Thursday to discuss and try to make a fast deal. Alluding to US assets in the region as potential targets, however, he said: If the US attacks us, then we have every right to defend ourselves.
The so-called democratic backsliding isn't the future: it's the present. This is what Human Rights Watch (HRW) has laid bare in its annual report, released this month. The compilation of human rights violations confirms that we're witnessing the collapse of the global order that was meticulously crafted over decades, amid the apparent passivity of many of its defenders. The new executive director of HRW, 52-year-old Philippe Bolopion,
More than 600 people may be in custody for political reasons, one Venezuelan rights group estimates. Venezuela's acting president has signed into law an amnesty bill that could see hundreds of politicians, activists and lawyers released soon, while tacitly acknowledging what the country has denied for years that it has political detainees in jail. The law, signed on Thursday, in effect reverses decades of denials.
Specifically, it has emerged that Cellebrite's forensic extraction tools were used on his Samsung phone while it was in police custody following his arrest in July 2025. The phone was returned to him nearly two months later, in September, at which point Mwangi found that the phone was no longer password-protected and could be unlocked without requiring a password. It's been assessed with high confidence that Cellebrite's technology was used on the phone on or around July 20 and July 21, 2025.
It's been over a year since Ukrainian forces captured two North Korean soldiers in Russia's Kursk, but the fate of the two men still hangs in the balance as activists accuse the South Korean government of dragging its feet. The two have asked to relocate to South Korea. In the North, they could face punishment for letting themselves be taken alive. "I won't survive [going back]. Everyone else blew themselves up. I failed," one of the soldiers told South Korean newspaper Hankook Ilbo.
Fifteen members of Congress have written to Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, demanding to know what steps the United States has taken in response to the mistreatment of a Palestinian-American teenager who spent nine months in Israeli detention. The letter, led by Senator Peter Welch and first seen by the Guardian, is centered around the case of Mohammed Ibrahim, a Florida resident who was 15 when Israeli soldiers arrested him during a raid on his family's West Bank home in February 2025.
Retirees making up some of the nearly 3,000 people arrested for supporting Palestine Action since the organisation was proscribed have said they feel vindicated by the high court's decision to overturn the ban this week. However, uncertainty remains over whether their trials under terror laws may still go ahead after the government revealed it plans to appeal against the judgment made on Friday by three of the UK's most senior judges.
Closer cooperation between regulators and increased funding are needed for the UK to deal effectively with the human rights harms associated with the proliferation of artificial intelligence (AI) systems. On 4 February 2026, the Joint Committee on Human Rights met to discuss whether the UK's regulators have the resources, expertise and powers to ensure that human rights are protected from new and emerging harms caused by AI. While there are at least 13 regulators in the UK with remits relating to AI, there is no single regulator dedicated to regulating AI.
Federal attorneys admitted at a Feb. 9 court hearing that numerous immigrants apprehended by ICE agents over the past few months while attending immigration court hearings at 26 Federal Plaza are now being detained on multiple floors of the building. The revelation came after a judge ordered last year that ICE reduce the number of people detained at Federal Plaza after video footage from inside a detainment area there showed numerous men sleeping on the floor and sharing one toilet.
Under the new rules, EU states will be able to send asylum seekers to third countries they merely transited through, provided those countries are deemed to respect international standards for migrant treatment. They could also deport asylum seekers to safe third countries with which they have no prior ties, if an agreement is reached with the host state, the UK's Guardian newspaper reported.
Western governments, the U.S. under Donald Trump leading the pack, are caught in the grip of an anti-immigration fervor, enforcing cruel and degrading laws that violate human rights and undermine public safety. This entire approach toward immigrants is not only immoral but also rests on false economic claims, argues Daniel Mendiola, assistant professor of history and migration studies at Vassar College, in the interview that follows.
Iranian security forces have arrested several figures from the country's reformist movement, local media reported on Monday, as Tehran's crackdown on dissent continues to widen. Those arrested include Azar Mansouri, the head of the Reformist Front, which represents several factions, former diplomat Mohsen Aminzadeh and Ebrahim Asgharzadeh, who was part of the group that stormed the US Embassy in Tehran in 1979.
Do not use any information from a non-government source (e.g., an NGO, even if it is or has been funded by the U.S. government, or media) that advances policies inconsistent with presidential executive orders, including promotion of 'racial justice,' 'diversity, equity, and inclusion,' and gender ideology, the cable says, per . The department deems such sources not to be credible, the cable goes on. The extraordinary instruction could be applied widely, as Politico points out. Many major human rights groups like Amnesty International tout their investment in initiatives like DEI, as do many large news outlets like The New York Times.
On Wednesday (February 4, 2026), Maja T.*, an anti-fascist activist from the eastern German city of Jena (Thuringia), was found guilty by a court in Hungary of having attacked and seriously injured several suspected right-wing extremists in Budapest in February 2023. The attacks had apparently been directed at individuals thought to have participated in the annual "Day of Honor" rally of neo-Nazis from all over Europe, held in the Hungarian capital.
Never, ever in the history of humanity have we had the information in front of our eyes watching more clearly than now, Guardiola told reporters in Manchester, England. The genocide in Palestine, what happened in Ukraine, what happened in Russia, what happened all around the world in Sudan, everywhere, he said. What happened in front of us? Do you want to see it? It's our problems as human beings. It's our problems.
"The global human rights system is in peril," wrote HRW executive director Philippe Bolopion. "Under relentless pressure from US President Donald Trump, and persistently undermined by China and Russia, the rules-based international order is being crushed."
