Kategorie: Humans

European governments must act to ensure equal and universal access to abortion care in the face of ongoing restrictions and intensifying efforts to further limit access to abortion across the region, said Amnesty International in a report published today. 

When rights aren’t real for all: The struggle for abortion access in Europe reveals how – despite hard won progress – harmful and dangerous obstacles continue to undermine access to abortion care. This is taking place in the context of increasingly well-resourced anti-rights groups ramping up their efforts to negatively influence policies and laws, often through the spread of fear and disinformation, aimed at further restricting access to abortion.

Hard-won victories on reproductive rights are at serious risk of being reversed by a wave of regressive policies

“The stark reality is that despite significant progress across Europe, abortion access is still restricted by a disturbing array of visible and invisible barriers,” said Amnesty International’s Senior Campaigner on Women’s Rights, Monica Costa Riba. 

“Hard-won victories on reproductive rights are at serious risk of being reversed by a wave of regressive policies promoted by the anti-gender movement and championed by populist political actors deploying authoritarian practices.”  

While law reforms in many European countries – with some notable exceptions – have made abortion more available, numerous administrative, social and practical barriers preventing universal abortion access remain in place. These include medically unjustified requirements which delay access, conscience-based refusals of care, a shortage of trained professionals, gestational time limits and high costs. Marginalized communities, including people with low incomes, adolescents, people with disabilities, LGBTIQ+ people, sex workers, people seeking asylum or with precarious migration status, are disproportionately affected by these obstacles. 

These barriers, combined with various degrees of criminalization, result in further stigmatization, causing delays or even preventing access to essential healthcare. At least 20 countries in the region impose criminal sanctions on pregnant people who have an abortion outside the scope of the law.  

Barriers to abortion 

In addition to gestational time limits and criminalization, there are several key barriers to accessible abortion.  

The cost of accessing abortion can be prohibitive particularly in countries where abortion care on request (when the decision to end a pregnancy rests with the pregnant person) is not included in their health insurance or national health system. This is the case in countries such as Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Germany, Latvia, Montenegro, Romania, Bosnia & Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Kosovo and Serbia.

Several states are failing in their duty to guarantee access to abortion care in contexts of high numbers of conscience-based refusals of services, where healthcare professionals refuse to provide abortions due to personal views or religious beliefs, result in delays or denial of access. In countries such as Italy or Croatia, refusals of this kind are widespread and in Romania they are also on the rise, and in all cases the authorities are not taking the action they are obliged to under international law to mitigate the harms of such high refusal rates and guarantee access to abortion care to those in need.  

At least 12 European countries continue to enforce medically unnecessary mandatory waiting periods before accessing a legal abortion and 13 countries enforce compulsory counselling. Albania, Belgium, Germany, Hungary, Latvia and Portugal require both mandatory waiting periods and compulsory counselling. In Hungary, those seeking an abortion are compelled to listen to the foetal heartbeat. In Türkiye, married women over the age of 18 are legally required to obtain spousal consent to terminate a pregnancy within the 10-week limit.  

Every year, thousands of pregnant people are forced to travel abroad to seek the healthcare they need due to the difficulties they face in accessing abortion care in their countries.  

Attempts to rollback access to abortion 

Attempts to rollback of abortion access across Europe are being led by a well-funded, transnational anti-gender movement comprised of conservative and religious groups and institutions, think tanks, civil society organizations and media influencers.  

In Croatia, the influence of anti-rights politicians in government, combined with a growing alliance between anti-abortion advocates and the Catholic Church, has led to repeated attempts to impose barriers to abortion access. In Slovakia, there have been repeated attempts in parliament to restrict or ban abortion access, while constitutional amendments passed in September 2025 will significantly erode reproductive rights. 

Hungary has introduced new barriers to accessing abortion, contraception and family planning and Italy’s governing party has led legislative initiatives to allow anti-abortion groups and those “supporting motherhood” to access mandatory counselling centres for pregnant people seeking a legal abortion. In these cases, the authorities have justified the measures with arguments including low birth rates or false and racist rhetoric about migrants “replacing” the white “native” population. 

Abortion is essential healthcare and a human right

Aggressive and sometimes violent anti-abortion protests and pickets outside sexual and reproductive health clinics have become an increasing barrier to abortion access. In Poland, an abortion centre set up in Warsaw in March 2025 has faced regular harassment and intimidation by groups protesting outside the building. In Austria, abortion healthcare providers face intimidation, including in front of their clinics, while family planning centres in France and centres providing mandatory counselling in Germany have also been attacked by anti-rights groups.  

“Abortion is essential healthcare and a human right,” said Monica Costa Riba.

“European governments and institutions must act decisively to bring abortion provision in line with international standards by decriminalizing abortion, eliminating existing access barriers and firmly resisting any moves by anti-rights groups to dangerously block people’s access to safe and timely abortion care, putting lives and health at risk”.” 

Background 

The report examines 40 counties and draws on Amnesty International’s research over the last decade, as well as data from reliable sources compiled by other human rights and public health organizations, including the Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR)’s publication “Europe Abortion Laws 2025”, the European Parliamentary Forum for Sexual and Reproductive Rights (EPF)’s ‘European Abortion policy Atlas’ and the World Health Organization (WHO) Global Abortion Policies Database. It also draws on insights from 11 abortion rights activists and sexual and reproductive health and rights organizations interviewed between May and September 2025.  

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The Tunisian authorities have over the past three years increasingly dismantled protections for refugees, asylum seekers and migrants, particularly Black people, with a dangerous shift towards racist policing and widespread human rights violations that endanger their lives, safety and dignity, Amnesty International said today. The European Union risks complicity by maintaining cooperation on migration control without effective human rights safeguards.

In a new report, ‘Nobody Hears You When You Scream’: Dangerous Shift in Tunisia’s Migration Policy, Amnesty International has documented how, fuelled by racist rhetoric from officials, Tunisian authorities have carried out racially targeted arrests and detentions; reckless interceptions at sea; collective expulsions of tens of thousands of refugees and migrants to Algeria and Libya; and subjected refugees and migrants to torture and other ill-treatment, including rape and other sexual violence, while cracking down on civil society providing critical assistance.  

In June 2024, Tunisian authorities ordered an end to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) role in processing asylum claims, removing the only avenue for seeking asylum in the country. Yet EU cooperation with Tunisia on migration control has continued without effective human rights safeguards, risking EU complicity in serious violations and trapping more people where their lives and rights are at risk.

“The Tunisian authorities have presided over horrific human rights violations, stoking xenophobia, while dealing blow after blow to refugee protection. They must immediately reverse this devastating rollback by ending racist incitement and stopping collective expulsions that threaten lives. They must protect the right to asylum and ensure that they don’t expel anyone to places where they would be at risk of serious human rights violations. NGO staff and human rights defenders detained for assisting refugees and migrants must be released unconditionally,” said Heba Morayef, Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa at Amnesty International.

“The EU must urgently suspend any migration and border control assistance aimed at containing people in Tunisia and halt funding to security forces or other entities responsible for human rights violations against refugees and migrants. Instead of prioritizing containment and fuelling violations, EU cooperation with Tunisia must shift its focus to ensuring adequate protection measures and asylum procedures are available in the country, and incorporate clear, enforceable human rights benchmarks and conditions, to avoid complicity in violations.”

Amnesty International conducted research between February 2023 and June 2023 and interviewed 120 refugees and migrants from nearly 20 countries (92 men, 28 women, eight children aged 16–17) in Tunis, Sfax, and Zarzis. The organization also reviewed UN, media, and civil society sources and the official pages of local Tunisian authorities. Ahead of publication, Amnesty shared its findings with Tunisian, European, and Libyan authorities. No response had been received by the time of publication.

A crisis fuelled by racist rhetoric

Testimonies reveal a migration and asylum system designed to exclude and punish rather than protect. At least 60 of those interviewed by Amnesty, including three children, two refugees and five asylum seekers, were arbitrarily arrested and detained. Black refugees and migrants were targeted amid systemic racial profiling and successive waves of racist violence from individuals and security forces, triggered by the public advocacy of racial hatred, starting with President Kais Saied’s remarks in February 2023 and echoed by other officials and parliamentarians since.

The Tunisian authorities have presided over horrific human rights violations, stoking xenophobia, while dealing blow after blow to refugee protection. They must immediately reverse this devastating rollback by ending racist incitement and stopping collective expulsions that threaten lives.

Heba Morayef, Amnesty International

The situation was aggravated by a surge of repressive measures targeting at least six NGOs providing critical support to refugees and migrants. This has had horrific humanitarian consequences and led to an enormous gap in protection. Since May 2024, authorities have arbitrarily detained at least eight NGO workers and two former local officials who cooperated with them. The next hearing in the trial of the staff of one of these organizations, the Tunisian Council for Refugees, is scheduled for 24 November.

‘We saw them drown’

Amnesty International investigated 24 interceptions at sea and spoke to 25 refugees and migrants who described life-threatening, reckless and violent behaviour by the Tunisian coastguard, such as dangerous ramming; high-speed manoeuvres threatening to capsize boats; hitting people and boats with batons; firing tear gas at close range; and the denial of any individualised protection assessment at disembarkation.

“Céline”, a Cameroonian woman migrant intercepted after departing from the eastern region of Sfax in June 2023, told Amnesty International:

“They kept hitting our [wooden] boat with long batons with sharp endings, they pierced it… There were at least two women and three babies without life vests. We saw them drown and then we could not see the bodies anymore. I have never been so scared.”

Despite ongoing concerns about the lack of transparent reporting regarding interceptions, in 2024 the Tunisian authorities stopped publicly sharing data on these operations after establishing a maritime search and rescue region (SRR) supported by the EU. Prior to that, they had reported a significant increase in interceptions. 

‘Go to Libya, they will kill you’

From June 2023 onwards, Tunisian authorities started to collectively expel tens of thousands of refugees and migrants, mostly Black people, either following racially motivated arrests or following interceptions at sea. Amnesty International found that between June 2023 and May 2025, authorities carried out at least 70 collective expulsions, involving more than 11,500 people.

Tunisian security forces have been routinely dumping migrants, asylum seekers and refugees, including pregnant women and children, in remote and desert areas at the country’s borders with Libya and Algeria. They abandoned them without food or water and usually after confiscating their phones, identification documents and money, placing them at great risk to their lives and safety. Following the first wave of expulsions in June-July 2023, at least 28 migrants were found dead along the Libyan-Tunisian border and 80 migrants were reported missing.

These expulsions have been carried out without any procedural safeguards and in violation of the principle of non-refoulement.

While people pushed toward Algeria had to walk back from the border over weeks or faced risks of “chain refoulement” from Algeria to Niger, those sent toward Libya were often handed to the Libyan Border Guards or other militias who left them stranded or detained them in abusive facilities. Refugees and migrants in Libya are subjected to widespread and systematic human rights violations and abuses, carried out with impunity, that a UN fact-finding mission has found amount to a crime against humanity.  

“Ezra”, an Ivorian man, told Amnesty International how Tunisian security forces expelled him to the Libyan border, overnight on 1-2 July 2023 from Sfax, with a group of 24 people, including at least one child.

“We reached the Libyan border zone at around 6am… One [Tunisian] officer said, ‘Go to Libya, they will kill you.’ Another officer said, ‘Either you swim, or you run to Libya.’ They gave us a bag filled with our smashed phones….”

The group attempted to walk up the coastline back to Tunisia, but Tunisian men in military uniforms intercepted them, pursued them with dogs, beat four of them and brought them back to the border.

“They made us chant ‘Tunisia no more, we will never come back’, again and again.”

Tunisian security forces subjected 41 men, women and children to torture and other ill-treatment during interceptions, expulsions or in detention.

“Hakim”, a Cameroonian national, described how officers drove and abandoned him and others at the Algerian border in January 2025:

“They took each of us one by one, surrounded us, they asked us to lay down, we were handcuffed… They beat us with everything they had: clubs, batons, iron pipes, wooden sticks… They made us chant ‘Tunisia no more, we will never come back’, again and again. They punched us and kicked us, everywhere on our body.”

Amnesty International also documented 14 incidents of rape or other forms of sexual violence by Tunisian security forces, some of which took place in the context of abusive pat or strip-searches conducted in a humiliating manner likely amounting to torture.

“Karine”, a Cameroonian woman, told Amnesty International that male National Guard officers raped her twice on 26 May 2025, first during an abusive strip search after an interception in the region of Sfax, then at the Algerian border after a collective expulsion.

EU reckless support at the expense of lives and dignity

Failing to learn from the devastating results of its cooperation with Libya, the ongoing EU-Tunisia cooperation on migration control has pursued and resulted in the containment of people in a country where they are exposed to widespread human rights violations. Such cooperation involves funding the Tunisian coastguard’s search-and-rescue capacities and providing training and equipment for border management to reduce irregular crossings to Europe.

“We reached the Libyan border zone at around 6am… One [Tunisian] officer said, ‘Go to Libya, they will kill you.’ Another officer said, ‘Either you swim, or you run to Libya.’ They gave us a bag filled with our smashed phones….”

Ezra”, an Ivorian man expelled to the Libyan border

The EU signed its Memorandum of Understanding with Tunisia in July 2023, developed without effective human rights safeguards, such as a transparent prior human rights impact assessment, independent human rights monitoring with clear procedures to follow up on allegations of violations, and an explicit suspensive clause allowing for the agreement to be suspended in case of violations. The European Ombudsman noted these shortcomings in an inquiry in 2024. This cooperation remains ongoing more than two years later, despite alarming and well-documented reports of violations. Yet, while prioritizing migration control at the expense of international law, it has been touted by European officials as a success, citing a significant reduction in irregular sea arrivals of people from Tunisia since 2024.

“The silence of the EU and its member states over these horrific abuses is particularly alarming. Each day the EU persists in recklessly supporting Tunisia’s dangerous assault on the rights of migrants and refugees and those defending them, while failing to meaningfully review its migration cooperation, European leaders risk becoming complicit,” said Heba Morayef.

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• At least 40 people reportedly killed in drone attack outside El Obeid
• Civilians trapped in El Obeid must be allowed to leave safely
• All states – especially UAE – must end supply of arms to RSF

Civilians in Sudan’s Kordofan region must be protected amid reports of escalating Rapid Support Forces (RSF) attacks in the area, Amnesty International said today.

The RSF have seized the town of Bara in North Kordofan in recent days and stepped-up attacks around the nearby city of El Obeid. On 3 November, a drone strike reportedly killed at least 40 people at a funeral outside El Obeid. Besides encircling El Obeid, the RSF have also continued to besiege the city of Kadugli in South Kordofan.

“The world cannot continue to turn its back on civilians in Sudan, especially in the Kordofan region, when the grave dangers they face are clear for all to see. It is unconscionable to stand by as civilians are at risk of being killed by RSF fighters. There must be no repeat of the horrific bloodshed and atrocities we have seen in reports emerging from El Fasher in recent weeks,” said Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General.

“The RSF must immediately end all attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure, and guarantee safe passage for civilians trying to leave El Obeid and seek sanctuary elsewhere. All states fuelling the Sudan conflict must immediately put a stop to this. The United Arab Emirates in particular must end its military assistance, including the supply of weapons, to the RSF.

“International and regional supporters of the RSF must also demand that its forces respect international humanitarian law and ensure civilians are protected. They must also do whatever they can to to prioritize and enhance accountability for violations and abuses.”

Since the RSF took control of the city of El Fasher from Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) on 26 October, multiple videos have emerged revealing a series of mass killings and attacks on civilians.

The world cannot continue to turn its back on civilians in Sudan, especially in the Kordofan region, when the grave dangers they face are clear for all to see.

Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General

In a statement issued on 3 November, the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court expressed alarm regarding reports emerging from El Fasher about mass killings, rapes, and other crimes allegedly committed during the course of attacks by the RSF. 

“The international community – including the UAE, the UN Security Council, EU member states, the United Kingdom, United States, Russia, and China – has failed the people of Sudan. They must put urgent pressure on the RSF leadership to end their brutal attacks on civilians,” said Agnès Callamard. 

Amnesty International is also calling on relevant regional bodies – including the African Union, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and the Arab League – to further pressure the RSF to end attacks on civilians.

Background

The ongoing conflict in Sudan began in April 2023. It has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced over 12 million, making it the world’s largest humanitarian crisis. The RSF, a paramilitary force fighting the SAF, has laid siege to El Fasher since May 2024. On 26 October, the RSF claimed that it had taken control of parts of El Fasher, the last major city in Darfur under SAF control. On 27 October, the SAF announced it had withdrawn its forces from the city.

El Fasher was home to over 1.5 million people, including hundreds of thousands of internally displaced persons who fled fighting in other parts of Darfur in the early-2000s and from the ongoing conflict. It is estimated that around 260,000 civilians were trapped in the city ahead of the attacks on 26 October.

Amnesty International has documented war crimes by the RSF and allied Arab militias where they jointly carried out ethnically targeted attacks against the Masalit and other non-Arab communities in West Darfur.

Amnesty International has previously documented how the conflict in Sudan is being fuelled by a constant flow of weapons into the country, in flagrant breach of the existing arms embargo on Darfur.

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• The French short term residency system violates human rights of racialized migrant workers, trapping them in precarious, exploitative and abusive conditions. 
• Human rights abuses against racialized migrant workers are systematic and structural.
• By exposing these workers to abuses through its migration policy, France is discriminating against them, with women disproportionately affected.

New research from Amnesty International exposes how France’s residence permit system for migrant workers is trapping racialized people in administrative limbo and leaving them vulnerable to labour exploitation, homelessness and poverty.

The short-term residence permits system, which allow workers to stay in France for up to 4 years in theory, often less in practice, creates exploitation, instability and insecurity. Amnesty International has documented a wide range of abuses which affect migrant workers, particularly coming from countries such as Mali, Côte d’Ivoire, Gambia, Angola, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo, India and Sri Lanka, with precarious residence permits.

Abuses included wage theft, extended working hours, dangerous working conditions, and multiple instances of violence perpetrated by employers, particularly on the grounds of race, including physical violence and sexual harassment.

The system’s many failings, including computer bugs and administrative delays, can have devastating consequences, causing people to lose their income and social security benefits, leaving them unable to meet their basic needs and at risk of homelessness.

This situation is as cruel as it is unacceptable. Thousands of migrant workers – primarily racialized individuals employed in key sectors of the French economy – including construction, domestic work, and cleaning – are living permanently under the threat of having their residence permits refused or not renewed.

“This situation is as cruel as it is unacceptable. Thousands of migrant workers – primarily racialized individuals employed in key sectors of the French economy – including construction, domestic work, and cleaning – are living permanently under the threat of having their residence permits refused or not renewed. Many have spent decades in France enduring this constant uncertainty, said Erika Guevara Rosas, Senior Director of Research, Advocacy, Policy and Campaigns at Amnesty International.

Amnesty International’s research, At the mercy of a piece of paper: How the French state traps migrant workers in precarity, carried out in France between April 2024 and September 2025, was based on interviews with 27 racialized migrant workers of 16 different nationalities and 39 experts, including sociologists, legal experts, economists, lawyers, heads of charities, trades unions, and journalists.

Successive French governments have created increasingly restrictive and excessively complicated administrative requirements around residence permits and their renewal. To obtain a residence permit, the applicant needs a work permit, applied for by their employer and issued by the local authority. But in order to obtain a work permit, the applicant needs a residence permit.

Unsurprisingly, this vicious circle results in violations of foreign workers’ rights. Many workers have no choice but to endure difficult and dangerous working conditions – particularly in the construction industry- unpaid overtime, and exploitation by unscrupulous employers. They are unable to speak out about their situation for fear of losing their jobs and, therefore, their residence permit.

Annie, a Comorian cleaner for a multinational cleaning company, saw her monthly salary halved by her employer in the summer of 2024. When she demanded the wages due to her, her employer replied that because she hadn’t had a residence permit for two weeks, she should have been suspended. Annie noted that this had not stopped the employer from making her work, only from paying the hours she worked.

Ever-shifting goalposts mean from one day to the next, someone living and working in France entirely regularly can find themselves in an irregular situation due to any number of failings by the residence permit system including administrative errors of failures.

Nadia, a domestic worker and single mother, lost her residence rights for a period of three years. Despite submitting her complete application in full and on time, it was not processed. She was then denied the right to work and lost her social security benefits leaving her unable to pay for food, rent or bills for her and her child.

Other people interviewed, like Paul, a painter and decorator, needed to renew his residence permit and to do so he needed a work permit. However, his employer didn’t apply for one. After four months of working without pay, he contacted a lawyer, which culminated in him losing his job. Without a work permit and unable to find more work, he was then issued an expulsion order.

“Lives are being disrupted, devastated, shattered. Imagine following the letter of the law, submitting your application to renew your residence permit on time, and then having no news or access to decision makers in the local authorities. Your previous residence permit expires and, from one day to the next, you find yourself in an irregular situation. A lack of response from the administration can lead to losing everything: your job, your resources, your right to live and work in the country you have called home for years,” said Anne Savinel-Barras, President of Amnesty International France.

Far from being isolated cases committed by unscrupulous employers, Amnesty International found violations of racialized migrant workers’ rights are systemic – rooted in the precariousness of workers’ legal status, aggravated by decades of restrictive French migration policy. Through this system of deliberately precarious residence permits, the French authorities contribute to and facilitate the exploitation and discrimination against racialized foreign workers.

“Action must be taken by the state now to rectify a system that it is not only directly harmful but also enables abuse by unscrupulous employers. People often referred to as ‘essential workers’ are being treated with anything but the respect such a label merits. Only a law and system that fully comply with human rights standards can safeguard everyone’s interest,” said Erika Guevara Rosas.

“Immediate steps must be taken to tackle the racism and precarity at the heart of this cruel system. This includes simplifying administrative procedures, strengthening safeguards against failures, and, crucially, ensuring far greater security of residence status through a single and stable work permit. All reforms to the residence permit law and system must be created in partnership with civil society: trades unions, employers, companies, and associations – and above all, with the racialized migrant workers who are currently suffering most under it.”

For more information, to request the embargoed report or to arrange an interview, please contact press@amnesty.org

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From 10-21 November, world leaders, scientists, activists, negotiators, diplomats, Indigenous Peoples and other affected communities will gather in Belém, Brazil for COP30, the annual UN climate conference.

COP30 arrives at a critical moment. It’s the first conference since the news that the world passed the 1.5°C threshold of heating above pre-industrial levels, a limit long considered vital to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. This milestone underscores the urgency of bold, coordinated action.

Putting human rights at the heart of climate policy is crucial for achieving climate justice. Leaders can stand up to corporate interests, push for a fast and just phase out of fossil fuels. COP also presents an opportunity to ensure environmental human rights defenders on the frontlines of climate change are protected and are allowed to meaningfully participate in climate decision making.

Leaders also have an opportunity to agree on how to scale up climate finance in the form of grants, not loans, to help those most impacted by climate change, rather than pushing countries the least responsible for climate change further into debt.

The science is undeniable. Climate change is getting worse and human activities, particularly the extraction and burning of fossil fuels, are the main cause. But if we work together, united by our shared humanity, we can create a future that delivers climate justice.

What is a COP meeting?

COP, or the Conference of Parties, is an annual meeting where states work together to make concrete commitments and come up with solutions to address climate change. Working together is essential; as the atmosphere is a shared global public good.

COP serves as the main decision-making body for the UN Framework for Climate Change (UNFCCC), an international environmental treaty that was established in 1994 to create a mechanism for climate negotiations and for the 2015 Paris Agreement.

COP is hosted in a different location every year. This year, the 30^th meeting is being held in Bélem, Brazil.

Why is this year’s meeting so important?

Every COP meeting is important, but the stakes are higher than ever this year.

At previous COP meetings, leaders emphasized a shared goal to keep the increase in global average temperatures from pre-industrial levels to less than 1.5°C. However, it’s been confirmed that the world breached that threshold in 2024. Due to geographic and other factors, some areas of the world are heating at even faster rates. 

According to climate science experts, the world is on course to be 2.8°C above pre-industrial levels by 2100. This will have catastrophic implications for billions of people and ecosystems.

While the climate crisis is fast deepening, many key governments have doubled down on fossil fuels over the past year. For example, an effort to secure critical sustainability legislation in the European Union is under threat. Other governments, such as Canada have loosened their regulations around fossil fuel extraction and processing.  The United States is pressuring other countries to slow down climate action and to purchase US fossil fuels.

Governments must mitigate the climate crisis by rapidly phasing out fossil-fuel emissions. This must be done now.

Spotlight on Brazil

This year’s meeting will also provide an opportunity to shine a light on the devastating effects of climate change and fossil fuel extraction in Brazil.

The government of Brazil is expanding fossil fuel extraction across the country. On 20 October, the Brazilian environmental agency granted the state-owned oil company Petrobras a license to drill in the mouth of the Amazon. This will have serious negative impacts on the climate, as well as on the local environment. It poses a direct threat to local water and soil and to the ecological balance. This oil extraction will also cause serious harm to the Indigenous People and traditional communities in the region, like the Karipuna, Palikur-Arukwayene, Galibi Marworno and Galibi Kali’na peoples, who have not been consulted about the project at all.

As the country prepares to host COP30 in Belém this year, the efforts to accelerate the license approval of fossil fuel projects at the mouth of the Amazon reveals a clear contradiction between the Brazilian government’s domestic actions and its desire to be a global leader in climate action.

How is climate change relevant to human rights?

Everyone has the right to live in a clean, healthy and sustainable environment. As the climate crisis intensifies, this right, and others, are under growing threat.

For instance, climate change causes disasters like prolonged droughts, which damage harvests and lead to food scarcity and rising food costs. After decades of steady decline, world hunger has risen again. This scarcity increases resource competition and can cause displacement, migration and conflict, leading to other human rights harms.

Global warming affects everyone, no matter where they live. It makes air pollution, often itself caused by burning fossil fuels or wildfires, worse. Disease carrying insects are spreading to new areas. Extreme heat causes deaths among outdoor workers and increases mortality rates in care homes and health facilities. Devastating floods after more intense storms also impact the rights to health, life and housing.

The damage caused by fossil fuel extraction, processing and transporting falls disproportionately in “sacrifice zones” where often already marginalised individuals and groups are subjected to harmful pollution. Lack of investment means public infrastructure is ill-equipped to survive extreme weather events.

Climate action runs on people power, and yet governments and the fossil fuel industry often work together to criminalise protest and stand by while human rights defenders are subjected to intimidation and threats. Attacks against our rights to free expression, association and peaceful assembly severely hamper activists’ ability to demand action from their governments to prevent fossil fuel pollution and climate harms.

What are “frontline” and “fenceline” communities?

“Frontline” communities are those who bear the brunt of direct and indirect impacts of the climate crisis. People living in these areas are more likely to experience rapid or slow onset events that are caused by climate change. In many cases, people living in these communities are already marginalised and experience intersecting forms of cultural, economic, social and racial discrimination.

“Fenceline” communities are made up of people who live near industrial infrastructure, including locations where fossil fuels are extracted, processed and burned. These often already marginalised and racialized people directly experience the adverse impacts of pollution and environmental degradation caused by extractive industries and live in areas that are “sacrificed” to the impacts of pollution. This is a form of environmental racism, that sacrifices people’s human rights and wellbeing for the sake of profit.

Spotlight on Pakistan

Pakistan contributes less than 1% of global emissions, but its population – particularly very young children and older adults – are suffering some of the most severe harms from climate change. Pakistan is one of the countries most vulnerable to climate disasters.

In 2022, Pakistan experienced record heatwaves, with much of the country reaching 50°C. These above-average temperatures fuelled greater rainfall during the monsoon season, with some parts of the country receiving more than 700% of their average monthly rainfall. The Indus River that runs the length of the country, burst its banks and flooded communities. In 2024, the people of Pakistan faced the same combination of excessive heat and rain again.

Such events demonstrate the acute climate vulnerability that Pakistan faces, as well as the importance of preparedness for communities and populations most at risk. Other countries – especially high-income countries that have emitted the most greenhouse gases – have not done enough to support Pakistan to respond to climate change. Pakistan requires about USD 16 billion to recover from the losses and damages of the 2022 floods. Almost all the money it has received is in the form of high interest loans, but it is not reasonable to expect that Pakistan would generate a return on adaptation investments, such as climate resilient health, education, and public transit infrastructure.    The situation of Pakistan is not an isolated case but is emblematic of lower income countries that contributed the least to climate change and are the most impacted by it.

What needs to be agreed at COP this year to limit global warming and protect human rights?

With enough ambition, there is a lot that parties to the UNFCCC can do to advance climate justice. Governments can and must do more to halt the growth of the fossil fuel industry, which is compatible with states’ human rights obligations and the goal to limit global warming to below 1.5°C.

States and parties must also urgently submit their own national climate plans. These plans were originally due in February 2025, but even by late October 2025, only 61 countries had submitted one. Plans need to be framed around the protection of human rights. This means they need to include specific commitments, goals and timelines to:

• Phase out fossil fuels – committing to a full, fast, fair and funded plan to stop producing and using fossil fuels like coal, gas and oil.
• Protect civic space – elevating the voice of activists, human rights and land defenders in the push for climate action, protecting them from the intimidation, harassment and criminalization they too often experience.
• Massively scale up non debt creating climate finance from high income polluting countries – enabling lower income countries to phase out fossil fuels and to protect their populations from the inevitable harms climate change is already causing.

Phase out fossil fuels

To protect human rights and our future, we need a full, fast, fair and funded phase-out of coal, oil and gas. This won’t happen unless we end the billions of dollars in fossil fuel subsidies that keep this deadly industry alive. Only then can we limit the worst impacts of climate change and ensure everyone’s rights are protected.

We know that humans are the main source of greenhouse gases, by burning fossil fuels that concentrate in our atmosphere. These gases trap the sun’s heat, leading to a long-term rise in planet’s average temperature and causing shifts in weather patterns as well as sea-level rise that will wipe out small island states and much low lying coastal land.

There are many alternatives to fossil fuels, like wind and solar power, that will enable us to reduce our dependency on fossil fuels. This energy transition should be driven by the need to defend human rights, with materials and infrastructure produced and constructed in a way that respects human rights.  

Protection of civic space

Civil society organizations, children and youth, older persons, women, people with disabilities and Indigenous Peoples have an important role to play in pushing for ambitious COP outcomes. Yet there remain challenges in access and inclusion in UNFCCC negotiations. This is particularly concerning in the context of shrinking civic space in countries all over the world; COP should be a place where affected communities are able to speak and to be heard.

Globally, there is growing repression of climate activists, land and environmental defenders, journalists and other voices critical of governments’ climate inaction. Many defenders face human rights abuses, including intimidation, crackdowns on their rights to freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association, enforced disappearances, criminalization and smear campaigns, arrest and arbitrary detention, among others.

In recent years,  there have been worrying crackdowns on climate activism around COPs, including intensified clampdown on civil society in Azerbaijan in 2024 and fears of unlawful digital surveillance of participants in Dubai in 2023.

To combat this, we need to see public recognition of the important work of environmental human rights defenders. There should also be efforts to prevent reprisals against anyone participating in the conference.

Equitable climate finance

At COP29 last year, states and parties agreed on a new annual climate finance target of USD 300 billion by 2035, which is meant to help lower income countries respond and adapt to the effects of climate change. This is less than a quarter of the minimum demanded by many lower-income countries and activists and many governments have failed to follow through on their pledge. In addition to providing USD 300 billion, they also agreed to “mobilize” USD 1.3 trillion. This target includes private finance, which can be debt-creating for its recipients.

High income countries are continuing to shirk their obligations to provide climate finance, but there are plenty of ways in which additional finance could be raised. For example, ‘polluter pays’ taxes on fossil fuel companies could raise USD 941 billion. Redirecting fossil fuel subsidies (taxpayer support to fossil fuel companies) would raise USD 1.3 trillion.

COP30 needs to conclude with a clear plan and timeline for delivering on last year’s targets and for scaled up provision of grants-based finance. High income countries also need to contribute much more to the Fund for responding to Loss and Damage, which remains woefully underfunded.

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