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Kazakhstan’s Senate adopted two rights-violating laws on December 18, both of them threatening freedom of expression.

Throughout the year, HRW covered many human rights topics and crises around the world. From investigations into crimes against humanity and war crimes in Israel, Gaza, and Sudan, to rollbacks and victories for peoples' freedoms, these were among the most-read stories on our site in 2024.

What did you learn from Human Rights Watch’s videos this year? Whether you watched HRW advocates address the European Parliament or saw one of our reels on International Women’s Day, we hope you learned about how rights around the world are being violated – and defended. HRW’s video work was viewed several million times in 2025. Here are the 10 most viewed videos of the year.

Discussions are advancing at the United Nations on a new global treaty to guarantee every child’s right to a free education.

United States federal immigration enforcement agents now commonly operate masked and without visible identification, compounding the abusive and unaccountable nature of the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign, Human Rights Watch said today. The indefinite and widespread nature of these practices is fundamentally inconsistent with the United States’ obligations to ensure that law enforcement abuses are investigated and met with accountability.

When 29-year-old Norbert Amoya went to fetch water from a river in northern Zambia earlier this year, he found large numbers of dead fish and the water had a strange smell, he told a journalist. The cause was a major mining disaster.

The United Arab Emirates-backed Southern Transitional Council and the Yemeni government should immediately provide information on the whereabouts of the journalist Naseh Shaker and unconditionally release him.

We, the undersigned organizations, write to respectfully urge the Yemeni authorities in Aden—represented by the internationally recognized government led by the Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) and the de facto authority of the Southern Transitional Council (STC)—to immediately and unconditionally release Yemeni freelance journalist Naseh Shaker, who has now spent more than two years in detention.

(London, December 17, 2025) – Authorities in Kazakhstan have targeted independent journalists and media outlets in recent weeks, a coalition of nine human rights groups said today. The authorities have searched the newsroom of an independent news agency, detained media workers, and pressured journalists over their reporting.