Mary Lawlor. My role is to highlight that the work human rights defenders¹ do is legal and legitimate and remind governments of the international human rights commitments that they have freely made in this regard. These commitments were codified in the 1998 UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders but were all previously contained in the covenants and other international human rights treaties.

I also expose cases where human rights defenders are subjected to risk, including criminalisation, because of their work. This involves formally raising their cases with the relevant governments, issuing press releases and engaging in private diplomacy on the behalf of human rights defenders.

The tools I actually have are quite limited and non-binding. I rely mainly on the Special Procedures Communications system, which allows me to write to governments in cases where the rights of human rights defenders are alleged to have been violated. These formal letters question governments about the allegations made and ask them to provide further information on the details of the cases. For example, if a human rights defender has been detained and it is alleged that they have been denied medical care, it may be asked to specify the last time the person received a medical examination, in addition to probing the legality of their detention if it is related to their peaceful defence of human rights. The communication remains private for 60 days to give the government an opportunity to respond. After this period, the communication and any government response are published on a public database. Although governments are supposed to respond, many do not, and there is no mechanism to compel them to do so. I can issue press releases in particularly serious situations without having to wait for the 60-day deadline to expire. These can put pressure on governments to address alleged violations. I am also active on social media.

ML. Criminalisation is by far the most common risk reported by human rights defenders. This is happening in every region and the targets range from defenders of migrants and refugee rights, to indigenous peoples’ rights defenders, to environmental defenders to those advocating for good governance, transparency and accountability.

The criminalisation happens often under broad and vaguely worded state-security or counter-terror legislation, by contending that human rights defenders are supporting terrorism or posing a risk to state security by exposing human rights violations carried out by the state. We have seen how restrictive legislation has continued to be introduced across the world, smothering the ability of human rights defenders to do their work.

A second trend has been the renewed assault on the rights of women and LGBTI persons and the consequent rise in attacks against people defending these rights. Again, this has been visible in every region of the world.

One of the elements that surprised me most when I started the Mandate was how under-represented cases from sub-Saharan Africa had been in Special Procedures over the previous ten plus years. We are trying to address this by reaching out more pro-actively to defenders in Africa and encouraging them to use the Mandate as a tool of protection. Over the past four years, we have organised numerous online meetings to introduce them to the Mandate, listen to their stories and see how we might better support them. For example, in June, we met with a number of Ethiopian women defenders to hear how the ongoing crackdown on civil society in the country is impacting them, and what the gender-specific impacts are. After such meetings, and when the defenders so wish, I often post about them on social media to raise the visibility of the defenders concerned. In November I will go on an academic visit to South Africa and Ghana to attend two gatherings of defenders from across the region. At these meetings, I will highlight how the Mandate may help them and encourage them to provide additional information on the specific human rights risks they face.

ML. Rather than being used as sites of potential reform, prisons have taken on a role of purely punishment when it comes to the targeting of human rights defenders. They are increasingly being used to not just remove a person’s liberty but to further punish them through ill-treatment, denial of adequate medical care and denial of family visits. They are being used to strip the humanity of human rights defenders.

Whenever I go on an official visit to a country where I know there are human rights defenders in prison, I make a request to visit them, even though they are not always granted. My visits aim at expressing solidarity with the imprisoned defender, giving them a helping hand and letting them know that the outside world has not forgotten them. They also send a very clear message to the government and the prison administration that this defender’s case is being watched closely. This may lead to better treatment, even if just in the short term. For example, one of the women I visited in prison, who has since been released, received a thorough medical examination in the days before I met her, something that had rarely happened to her previously. General treatment can also improve.

Unfortunately, there are countries where this will never be permitted and where the conditions of detention are simply not known. This is true for many of the human rights defenders detained in Russia in recent years, or in Iran or in China, for example.

ML. I think the role is the same as it always was - to protect, promote and advance internationally recognised human rights. What has changed is perhaps awareness of the concept of human rights defenders, which has become more widespread, and the range of rights which are now recognised at international level.

I am thinking here in particular of the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment, which was recognised by the Human Rights Council in 2021 and the General Assembly in 2022. We have seen waves of young people getting involved in climate activism. They have been instrumental in forcing this issue onto the international agenda and demanding real action. The Israel war on Gaza has also mobilised tens of thousands of people around the world who have taken to the streets to demand a halt to the savage Israeli assault on a captive population in Gaza in the face of foot-dragging by powerful states that claim to espouse human rights ideals. These protesters are highlighting the hypocrisy that is often at the heart of action in favour of human rights.

Authoritarian governments continue to treat human rights defenders as they have always, by criminalising, defaming and attacking them. However, we have seen a worrying trend in democracies and semi-democracies where the rights to freely assemble and associate, cornerstones of human rights defence, are coming under pressure.

This has been evident in the crackdowns in Europe and the USA on student-led protests against the continued war in Gaza, and on the non-violent civil disobedience carried out by climate activists. Earlier this year I wrote to the UK government over my profound concerns relating to the sentencing of a Just Stop Oil protester to six months in prison for engaging in a ‘slow march’. He was charged under the Public Order Act which colleagues in Special Procedures also wrote to the government about, given the far-ranging implications it holds for peaceful assembly in the UK.

More generally, in sensitising the public to human rights issues, I firmly believe human rights need to be taught in school, starting from primary school to ensure these values are embedded from a young age. This is particularly important nowadays when such polarisation exists.

ML. I continue to look back at the great achievements of human rights defenders. Last year, to mark the 25th anniversary of the UN Declaration on human rights defenders, I presented a report to the UN Human Rights Council which highlighted successes in the 25 years since the declaration had been adopted.

For example, in Bangladesh, an organisation run by children is preventing child marriages, despite death threats against its members. In 2021, human rights defenders in Thailand won a major court victory for local communities which revoked unlawful title deeds on 23 plots issued to oil palm plantations. In Zimbabwe, human rights defenders have won damages in a series of cases in which the government is held accountable for police brutality. Women human rights defenders in Indonesia played a vital role in passing a law in 2022 criminalising physical sexual abuse, including in marriage, sexual exploitation, forced marriage, including of children, and the circulation of non-consensual sexual content. In recent years, human rights defenders have won significant victories for the rights of LGBTI people in many places. From Belize to Botswana, Saint Lucia to Sri Lanka and elsewhere, discriminatory laws and practices have been challenged and defeated.

These are just some examples of the human rights defenders and stories that give me strength and hope in a world that can often seem devoid of it.

ML. In October I’ll present a report to the UN General Assembly on the contributions that human rights defenders make to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. With this report, I hope to demonstrate that there are people promoting and protecting human rights in every walk of life. It is not just human rights defenders working on civil and political rights, or NGO workers or human rights lawyers who can be considered defenders. We need to go back to the act in which a person engages and see whether, through that act, they are advocating for or helping realise the rights of others. If these people are at risk because of this work, then I would consider them as falling under my remit as Special Rapporteur on human rights defenders.

The international community has a role to play in recognising that the identities of human rights defenders are multifaceted, multigenerational and engaged in a multitude of professions. Many states must set aside their pre-conceived notions of who a human rights defender is or what they look like and take a concrete look at what the person is doing and what rights they are protecting.

Other priorities include a focus on the climate defenders and how laws are being weaponised against them, despite the triple planetary crisis (climate change, pollution and biodiversity loss) we face, as well as further work on best practices by states to provide support to human rights defenders at risk.

ML. I see my role as a bridge between civil society and states. I always say that impact is a collective effort and this is as true in this work as in any other advocacy work. I rely on civil society to provide me with credible information, which we verify, and they rely on me to bring cases to governments and actors that may not listen to them. We track all the cases we take up and see how the situation evolves for the human rights defenders in the months following my communication with government about them. This has allowed us to note improvements in some cases, whether that be a release on bail, a company dropping a lawsuit against an NGO, treatment of a human rights defender improving in prison or threats against a defender being taken seriously by law enforcement.

As for the response to the criminalisation of defenders, I believe that more needs to be done in condemning it, wherever it takes place. Too often, states go easy on their friends and unload on their adversaries, using human rights as a political tool to score points. This undermines the whole concept of universality as outlined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights 76 years ago.

Civil society can better support this work by ensuring equal documentation and treatment of human rights violations, as far as possible, across the world, and by sharing this data with international mechanisms.