Resources and Publications

Human rights defenders at risk often find it difficult to talk about their mental and emotional wellbeing, even when they are concerned about it. Cultures of human rights practice tend to emphasise self-sacrifice, heroism, and martyrdom. These norms inhibit defenders from expressing their anxieties and seeking help.

Global Analysis 2019 details the physical assaults, defamation campaigns, digital security threats, judicial harassment, and gendered attacks faced by HRDs and women human rights defenders (WHRDs) around the world. As recent events from Hong Kong to Baghdad have demonstrated, HRDs are at the forefront of social change and face significant threats and risks for doing so – whether demanding civil and political freedoms or protecting the environment and combating climate change.

Dispatches 2018 presents the work Front Line Defenders has undertaken around the world for the protection and security of human rights defenders at risk in 2018, including the impact of grants, training, advocacy, visibility, rest & respite and other programs.

Global Analysis 2018 details the physical assaults, defamation campaigns, digital security threats, judicial harassment, and gendered attacks faced by HRDs and women human rights defenders (WHRDs). December 2018 marked the 20th Anniversary of the HRD Declaration and the 70th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but HRDs around the world continue to face lethal threats from state, non-state, and corporate actors in their peaceful struggles for rights.