Source: Amnesty International –
The proliferation of attacks on civil society and social movements deepened in 2025, with sustained efforts to silence and disempower human rights defenders, organizations and dissenters spreading to almost every part of the world.
Authorities in Nepal and Tanzania were particularly brazen in their unlawful use of lethal force to repress protests expressing political and socio-economic grievances. The governments of Afghanistan, China, Egypt, India, Kenya, the USA and Venezuela, among others, also violently repressed protests, criminalized dissent through counterterrorism and security laws, or used abusive policing tactics, enforced disappearances or extrajudicial executions.
In the United Kingdom, authorities proscribed Palestine Action, a direct-action protest network primarily targeting Israeli arms manufacturers and their subsidiaries, under overly broad counterterrorism laws and arrested more than 2,700 people for peacefully opposing the ban. The UK High Court ruled this unlawful in February 2026. The government is appealing the decision.
Turkish authorities detained hundreds of peacefully protesters after the arrest of Istanbul mayor and presidential candidate Ekrem İmamoğlu, who is among over 400 people facing politically motivated prosecution under alleged corruption charges.
US authorities launched an unlawful clampdown on migrants, refugees and asylum seekers, committing unnecessary and excessive use of force, racial profiling, arbitrary detention, and practices that amounted to torture and enforced disappearance. In Latin America, states such as Ecuador, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Peru and Venezuela adopted or reformed legal frameworks that impose disproportionate controls on civil society organizations directly impacting their ability to operate, access resources, support communities and defend human rights.
Many governments, facilitated by corporate actors, used spyware and digital censorship to restrict freedom of expression and the right to information. US authorities used AI-powered surveillance tools to target foreign students expressing solidarity with Palestinians with arrest and deportation. Serbia’s government used spyware and digital forensics tools against student protesters, civil society and journalists. Kenyan authorities systematically deployed technology-facilitated repression tactics, including online intimidation, threats, incitement to hatred and unlawful surveillance, to suppress youth-led protests.
The USA, Canada, France, Germany and the UK, among others, announced or enacted sweeping cuts to international aid budgets, despite knowing they would likely result in millions of avoidable deaths, and in several cases while committing to massive parallel hikes in military expenditure. This has had a catastrophic impact on NGOs’ efforts to advance press freedom, climate resilience, and gender justice, to protect refugees, migrants and asylum seekers, and to provide healthcare and sexual and reproductive rights.
Many states continued to resist reining in the aggressive tax avoidance and evasion by billionaires and corporate giants while weakening further restraints on corporate power. In the USA, strategic lawsuits against public participation had a chilling effect on civil society, with one such lawsuit resulting in a court ordering Greenpeace to pay a fossil fuel company $345 million (reduced from an initial $660 million).
In a context dominated by the US president describing climate change as a “scam”, governments did nowhere near enough to address climate displacement, equitably transition away from fossil fuels, or adequately ramp up finance for climate action – even as the UN Environment Programme warned that the world is on track to reach 3°C above pre-industrial levels by 2100.
“What alternative do the bullies and predators offer to the imperfect global experiment they’re so intent on destroying? The world order they propose is one that mocks and discards racial, gender and climate justice, treats civil society as an enemy, and rejects international solidarity. It is built on silencing dissent, weaponizing the law and dehumanizing those deemed ‘others’. Their vision of the world is predicated not on respect for our common humanity, but on military force, trade domination and technological hegemony. It is, ultimately, a vision with no moral compass,” said Agnès Callamard.