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The UN Committee against Torture (CAT) reviewed Bahrain’s fourth periodic report (CAT/C/BHR/4) during its 83rd session in Geneva in November 2025. The dialogue focused heavily on the situation of human rights defenders (HRDs), torture, accountability, and conditions of detention. ISHR and partner organisations played a central role in ensuring that the Committee addressed the urgent cases of several detained human rights defenders.

As the genocide in Gaza exposes deep corporate complicity, experts and human rights defenders convened in Geneva to discuss urgent paths toward accountability. This discussion unpacked how businesses, investors, and States must act now to end profiteering from atrocity crimes.

On 26 November 2025, ISHR organised, in partnership with Development Dynamics, a legislative advocacy dialogue on the Nigerian Bill of Human Rights Defenders Protection.

14 NGOs that closely follow and engage with the General Assembly Third Committee have published a joint statement on outcomes of this 80th session.

A big thanks to everyone who is getting behind our fundraising appeal and investing in a better world by supporting human rights defenders!

UN experts report at least 150 defenders, dissidents, members of marginalised groups, and family members targeted by violence, refoulement, legal harassment, and intimidation in cases linked to China and several Southeast Asian States.

A coalition of 25 civil society organisations urges the Human Rights Council to pursue long-term, well-resourced reforms that strengthen—rather than shrink—its ability to respond to human rights crises.

In their interactive dialogues with the General Assembly’s Third Committee, treaty body chairs focused on critical obstacles preventing mandate fulfilment, including severely strained or non-existent financial and human resources leading to significant case backlogs.

During the 38th Human Rights Council special session on the human rights situation in and around El Fasher, in the context of the ongoing conflict in Sudan, ISHR delivered a joint statement with Sudanese Women’s Rights Action, and the Regional Coalition for Women Human Rights Defenders in South West Asia and North Africa.

The 2025 Martin Ennals Award recognises three outstanding human rights defenders who have spearheaded justice initiatives in Brazil, Uganda and Tunisia against racism and corruption in public institutions. The UN High Commissioner for human rights will award the selected laureate during the ceremony to take place on 26 November 2025 in Geneva, Switzerland.

Throughout its 85th session, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) saw the periodic reviews of Egypt, Tunisia, and Botswana, a report by the fact-finding mission on Sudan, and panels on the elimination of racial discrimination, the externalisation of migration management, and the right to a healthy environment.

In line with its mandate to advocate for the protection of human rights defenders before international and regional mechanisms, ISHR presented the situation of defenders' protection on the continent.