International Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR)

16/10/2026

🔎Conference Highlights: Transnational Repression — Defending Human Rights, Sovereignty and Security across the OSCE

On 6 October, IPHR hosted a side event at the Warsaw Human Dimension Conference to discuss practical ways the OSCE can prevent and respond to transnational repression (TNR).

Speakers explored how authoritarian governments target exiled activists, journalists, human rights defenders and diaspora communities through physical attacks, digital surveillance, administrative restrictions and politically motivated prosecutions.

Spanning all three OSCE dimensions, TNR is simultaneously a human rights, security and rule-of-law challenge requiring a coordinated cross-border response.

The discussion highlighted key priorities for the OSCE:
➡️ Appointing a dedicated focal point on TNR
➡️ Improving case documentation and cross-border cooperation
➡️ Developing common standards and specialised training for authorities
➡️ Strengthening legal safeguards and access to justice for those targeted

👉Read more about the speaker's interventions https://iphronline.org/articles/conference-highlights-transnational-repression-defending-human-rights-sovereignty-and-security-across-the-osce/

08/10/2026

🚨 Uzbekistan must release imprisoned Karakalpak activist Dauletmurat Tazhimuratov and investigate new allegations of torture.

In a handwritten letter smuggled out of prison, Tazhimuratov describes being severely beaten by prison officials on several occasions. He says that during one attack, officials also ordered him – a member of the Karakalpak minority – to declare that he is Uzbek.

His lawyer has reported seeing scars and marks on his body and says Tazhimuratov was denied medical assistance following the beatings.

Tazhimuratov has been imprisoned since 2022 and is serving a lengthy sentence following a politically motivated prosecution and unfair trial. The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has found his detention arbitrary and called for his release.

📢 IPHR, Norwegian Helsinki Committee, Ahrca Ngo, Freedom Now, CIVIL RIGHTS DEFENDERS, and Human Rights Foundation (HRF) call on the Uzbekistani authorities to:
🔹 Immediately release Tazhimuratov
🔹 Ensure his safety and provide necessary medical care
🔹 Independently investigate all reports of torture and ill-treatment
🔹 Hold those responsible to account
🔹 Ensure his rehabilitation and appropriate compensation
We also urge the international community to support these calls as a matter of priority.

🔗 Read the full joint statement on the IPHR website: https://iphronline.org/articles/uzbekistan-release-political-prisoner-dauletmurat-tazhimuratov-and-investigate-new-torture-allegations/

Authorities in Uzbekistan must immediately release political prisoner Dauletmurat Tazhimuratov and investigate his allegations of torture, the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, International Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR), Association for Human Rights in Central Asia (AHRCA), Freedom Now, Civil Rig...

06/10/2026

📢 Central Asia: Entrenched Restrictions and Emerging Threats to Civic Space

Across Central Asia, legitimate civic engagement and criticism of those in power are framed as threats to national security, stability and cohesion.

Independent civil society groups, particularly those receiving foreign funding, face heightened scrutiny and pressure. Peaceful assembly remains tightly constrained, while widespread impunity persists for serious past abuses related to the suppression of mass protests. ⚖️

Human rights defenders, activists, journalists, bloggers and other critical voices face ongoing and widening persecution, including retaliatory criminal charges, arrest and imprisonment – often under broadly worded Criminal Code provisions that give the authorities wide discretion to criminalise peaceful speech and activity.

At the same time, repression is evolving — increasingly extending into the 💻 digital sphere and 🌍 across national borders, with Central Asian governments targeting critics abroad, as well as individuals at home whose engagement is inconvenient to powerful neighbours.

In a joint statement for the 2026 Warsaw Human Dimension Conference, IPHR, КМБПЧ, Ahrca Ngo and Хроника Туркменистана call for concrete action to reverse these trends.

Central Asian governments should bring legislation and practice into line with their international commitments, end the criminalisation of peaceful civic activity 🚫, release those imprisoned for peacefully exercising their fundamental freedoms, ensure accountability for serious abuses, and protect civic actors from digital and transnational repression.

As international engagement with Central Asia grows, we also call on OSCE participating States and other international partners to ensure that closer political, economic, development and security cooperation does not come at the expense of fundamental freedoms. 🤝 They should maintain sustained scrutiny, set concrete expectations for progress, and provide flexible and sustainable support for independent civic actors across the region.

👉 Read the full statement and recommendations:
https://iphronline.org/articles/central-asia-entrenched-restrictions-and-emerging-threats-to-civic-space-joint-statement/

In a joint statement for the 2026 Warsaw Human Dimension Conference, International Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR), Kazakhstan International Bureau for Human Rights and Rule of Law (KIBHR), Association for Human Rights in Central Asia (AHRCA) and Turkmen Initiative for Human Rights (TIHR) draw a...

05/10/2026

🇰🇿 New Statement: Kazakhstan: Stop the Imminent Extradition of Yulia Emelyanova and Mansur Movlaev to Russia

📢 IPHR and partners have issued a joint statement calling on the Kazakhstani authorities to immediately halt the extradition of Yulia Emelyanova and Mansur Movlaev to Russia.

Emelyanova and Movlaev have been held in extradition detention in Kazakhstan since 2025. Their asylum claims have now been rejected at the final instance, putting them at imminent risk of being returned to Russia, where they could face torture and other serious human rights violations.

⚖️This statement calls on Kazakhstan to respect its international obligations, including the absolute prohibition of refoulement, and to release both individuals and ensure they can access effective protection or safely relocate to a third country.

❗ Russia increasingly uses extradition requests and regional law-enforcement cooperation to pursue critics beyond its borders. Extradition must not become a tool of transnational repression.

Read the full sattement here ➡️https://iphronline.org/articles/kazakhstan-stop-the-imminent-extradition-of-yulia-emelyanova-and-mansur-movlaev-to-russia/

International Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR) and partners have issued a joint statement calling on the Kazakhstani authorities to immediately halt the extradition of Yulia Emelyanova and Mansur Movlaev to Russia, where they would face a real risk of torture and other grave abuses. The NGO signa...

01/10/2026

🔎Conference highlights | Yesterday IPHR launched its new report, WHO IS YOUR GOD? Religious terror in the temporarily occupied territories.

🇺🇦The panel discussion moderated by Maria Tomak, Human rights expert, Researcher and advocacy at Truth Hounds explored the systematic persecution of religious communities and clergy under occupation.

Svitlana Valko Project Coordinator and Field Team Lead at IPHR presented the patterns of persecution from censorship, property seizures and destruction of places of worship to arbitrary detention, torture and sexual violence.

The panel also featured the testimony of a priest survivor, who shared a personal account of the abuses documented in the report and their impact on religious leaders and communities under occupation.

⚖️Nuvola Galliani, Legal Officer at IPHR then examined how these violations engage international law, including the potential qualification of certain acts as war crimes or crimes against humanity.

📖 Read the full report: https://iphronline.org/articles/conference-highlights-who-is-your-god/

30/09/2026

🇺🇦 New Report: WHO IS YOUR GOD? Religious terror in the temporarily occupied territories

Based on 12 testimonies from survivors and 21 testimonies, the report examines the systematic persecution of religious communities, clergy, and people of faith who refuse to submit to Russian political and religious influence or to associate themselves with Russia’s anti-Ukrainian propaganda and affiliated religious structures, in particular the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC).

It documents:

🔹Control and censorship of religious services,
🔹Searches and pillaging of religious property,
🔹Seizure or destruction of places of worship,
🔹Arbitrary detention, imprisonment, torture, and sexual violence

⚖️The report examines these acts not as isolated incidents, but as part of a broader pattern of repression, and considers their implications under international law.

Read the full report on IPHR's website https://iphronline.org/articles/who-is-your-god-religious-terror-in-the-temporarily-occupied-territories/

28/09/2026

🇦🇲 New Report — RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE IN ARMENIA’S 2026 ELECTIONS: A Post-election Examination

IPHR and Citizens’ Assembly Vanadzor examine the methods, actors, responses, and limits of the Russian interference campaign related to Armenia’s June 2026 parliamentary election.

The report draws on investigative reporting, election observation, digital investigations, and official statements. It examines links between information operations in Armenia and Russian state structures, contractors, and associated media networks, as well as the role of business and political intermediaries. It also looks at the response of Armenian institutions, independent observers, journalists, and international partners.

The evidence reviewed points to a sustained campaign combining:

🔹 Economic and diplomatic pressure

🔹 Information manipulation and influence operations

🔹 Suspected efforts to influence electoral participation through financial inducements and coercion

🔹 Intimidation and challenges to electoral legitimacy

Authors issue a set of recommendations for sustained action beyond election day.

Read the full report https://iphronline.org/articles/russian-interference-in-armenias-2026-elections/

25/09/2026

🇹🇯 TAJIKISTAN: International scrutiny and accountability remain essential

Yesterday in Geneva, IPHR joined CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation, Norwegian Helsinki Committee, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, FIDH - International Federation for Human Rights and OMCT in hosting a side event at the UN Human Rights Council. The event examined the recent closure of the Council’s consideration of a complaint concerning serious human rights violations in Tajikistan.

🎤 Moderated by Marius Fossum of the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, the well-attended side event brought together experts and civil society representatives to discuss the continuing human rights crisis in Tajikistan and the need for sustained international attention.

🔹 Sigrid Lipott, CIVICUS, outlined the UN Human Rights Council’s complaints mechanisms and procedures relating to Tajikistan and presented recommendations for reform.

🔹 Andrea Strasser Camagni, IPHR, highlighted the rapidly deteriorating civic space in Tajikistan, stressing that the end of the Council’s complaint procedure has not ended the country’s human rights crisis. Sustained international scrutiny, independent monitoring and accountability remain essential to turn government commitments into real change.

🔹 Lucy McKernan, Human Rights Watch, spoke about the 2021–2022 protests in Gorno-Badakhshan (GBAO) and the ensuing crackdown by government forces.

🔹 Former UN Special Rapporteur on Minority Issues Fernand de Varennes addressed the repression in GBAO and its devastating impact on the region’s population.

📢 Closing a UN procedure does not close the chapter on Tajikistan’s human rights crisis. Continued international attention, accountability and support for independent civil society and those affected by repression remain vital.

24/09/2026

📄New Policy Brief: OCCUPIED PORTS, INTERNATIONAL MARKETS Russia’s de facto reopening of the occupied ports of Mariupol and Berdiansk and how States, international organisations and market actors should respond

🚢 On 25 August 2025, Russia added the occupied Ukrainian ports of Mariupol and Berdiansk to its official list of ports, claiming to “reopen” them for international trade.

Despite this reopening having no legal effect, both ports are already embedded in Russia’s occupation economy and connected to international markets.

Our new policy brief draws on IPHR’s analytical report to examine how commercial and logistical links can enable trade through occupied Ukrainian ports despite their unlawful status. It provides practical recommendations for States, international organisations, maritime, financial and commercial actors, customs and port authorities, sanctions bodies, and civil society to

🔹 identify and verify occupied-port trade

🔹 close gaps in the application of existing legal frameworks

🔹 strengthen due diligence and enforcement

🔹 disrupt the facilitation chain behind such trade

The objective is clear: occupied Ukrainian ports should not become normalised as legitimate points of international commerce.

📄 Read the new brief: https://iphronline.org/articles/new-policy-brief-occupied-ports-international-markets/

24/09/2026

📢 NEW IPHR REPORT: On Unsteady Ground – Human Rights Defenders in Tajikistan

The space for independent human rights work in Tajikistan has shrunk dramatically over the past two decades, leaving the country’s once vibrant human rights community struggling for survival.

Human rights groups have faced increasingly restrictive legislation and mounting pressure, with those working on issues deemed politically sensitive being particularly targeted.

Human rights defenders, lawyers, journalists, bloggers and activists have been prosecuted for peacefully carrying out their professional work and exercising their fundamental rights. Some are currently serving lengthy prison terms on politically motivated charges.

Our new 37-page report traces the developments that have led to the current situation, drawing on ongoing research and more than two dozen interviews with human rights activists from across Tajikistan.

⚠️ The loss of Tajikistan’s human rights community would mean losing decades of expertise in documenting violations, assisting victims, providing legal aid and advocating for reform.

🌍 The report calls on international actors to speak out about human rights violations, support independent civil society through long-term funding, and help preserve the expertise and networks that Tajikistan’s human rights defenders have built over decades.

🔗 Read On Unsteady Ground: https://iphronline.org/articles/tajikistan-survival-of-human-rights-community-at-stake-amid-deepening-repression-new-report/

The space for independent human rights work in Tajikistan has shrunk dramatically over the past two decades, leaving the country’s once vibrant human rights community struggling for survival, International Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR) warns in a new report. The 37-page report, On Unsteady G...