Human Rights Watch Report Shows Growing Concern for SEA

Human Rights Watch, a non-governmental organisation headquartered in New York, released its World Report 2025 in January, highlighting the world’s most pressing rights issues in 2024.

Asia, which broadly covers 48 countries from as far west as Turkey and as far east as Japan, has had some success stories. The two that highlight this are student-led protests in Bangladesh, forcing the ousting of former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, and people rallies in South Korea blocking President Yoon Suk Yol’s attempt at martial law.

“2024 was an extraordinary year for people-power movements across Asia,” Elaine Pearson, Asia Director at Human Rights Watch, told a press conference at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand.

Southeast Asia

But in Southeast Asia, the HRW report finds that Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam have continued to see their human rights decline.

For Thailand, political turmoil took center stage. The Shinawatras became Thailand’s ruling family once again, with Paetongtarn Shinawatra, the youngest daughter of former PM Thaksin Shinawatra, being elected prime minister.

However, Thailand saw a major setback in democratic rule, according to the HRW report, after the Move Forward Party, which won the 2023 general elections but was blocked from taking government by the Thai Senate, was officially dissolved by Thailand’s Constitutional Court.

Thailand also continues to facilitate and aid transnational repression, returning refugees and asylum seekers at risk of persecution in their home countries, including people from Cambodia and Vietnam, who had fled due to challenging government policies, mostly for their respective political activism.

This will come under further scrutiny in the future after Thailand won its bid for a seat on the UN Human Rights Security Council and began its three-year term on January 1.

On the plus side, Thailand did enact the marriage-equality law, giving same-sex couples the legal right to marry and benefit from the same rights as heterosexual couples. The law came into effect on January 23.

“Now we don't have to hold our mouths back; we don't have to be discreet anymore in saying that Thailand is now progressing more into becoming an open place, an inclusive place for LGBTQI couples, for those who are in relationships and want to register their marriage," Mookdapa Yangyuenpradorn, a human rights specialist at Fortify Rights, said.

Myanmar

Myanmar has seen its fourth year since its military staged a coup that today sees the country in the midst of a revolution-style civil war against junta rule. The military’s barbaric crackdown on the country’s human rights has been epitomised by its killing of over 6,000 civilians since February 2021.

For 2024, at least 1,814 people were killed due to the conflict, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners.

The junta has also continued to resort to its scorched earth tactics, destroying villages and entire infrastructures with airstrikes and ground attacks that amount to crimes against humanity.

“The Myanmar military has increasingly committed grave crimes against civilians and civilian infrastructure in response to heightened resistance from armed anti-junta groups and ethnic minority armies,” said Bryony Lau, the deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The suffering of villagers has been made all the worse by the junta’s determination to block humanitarian aid from reaching those in need.”

But what has been a small light for Myanmar is that opposition groups to the military occupy over 60 percent of the country, meaning the junta’s nationwide control is decreasing.

Cambodia and Vietnam

Cambodia continues to crack down on activists who are deemed a threat to its government. Prime Minister Hun Manet—who became Cambodia's premier in 2023, succeeding his father Hun Sen after nearly four decades in power—has continued his father’s legacy, targeting dissidents who oppose the government’s policies.

The HRW report highlights how nearly 100 Cambodians were arrested in July for criticizing Cambodia’s 20-year-old economic and trade pact with Laos and Vietnam, called the Cambodia-Laos-Vietnam Development Triangle Area (CLV-DTA) agreement. Out of the 94 arrested, 33 face charges of plotting and incitement, potentially facing a decade in prison.

HRW has also investigated how there have been threats and bribes to opposition lawmakers from Cambodian government officials to cease support for opposition candidates in Cambodia’s Senate elections in February 2024.

“Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet has followed in his father’s footsteps by intensifying the use of repressive laws and politicized courts to silence critics and human rights defenders. Democracy in Cambodia exists in name alone, and the little space that remains for critical views, civil society, and media does so under constant threat of persecution,” Lau added.

A similar type of crackdown has occurred in Vietnam, where 43 rights campaigners were convicted and sentenced on what HRW calls “bogus” charges for their advocacy. Vietnam is governed by a communist one-party regime that prohibits independent civil society, rights groups, and media.

Emilie Palamy Pradicihit, owner of Manushya Foundation, a human rights organisation in Bangkok, says the report shows human rights in Asia are in “decline”.

“The HRW World Report 2025 confirms that human rights in Asia are in sharp decline, with authoritarian regimes tightening their grip through digital repression, criminalizing climate activism, and expanding transnational crackdowns on dissent,” she said.

“The crackdown on environmental defenders under the guise of ‘green deals’—particularly in Vietnam and Cambodia—exposes how repression is being rebranded as 'just transition' and development. Southeast Asia has also become a hotspot for transnational repression, with Thailand facilitating the forced return of dissidents to authoritarian states,” she added.

Laos

But there is no room for the 546 report to include Laos, the landlocked country that is also governed under a Communist one-party state. It is one of the poorest countries in the region.

Human Rights Watch has previously said that Lao authorities have failed to prevent or properly respond to attacks against critics of its government, human rights defenders, and political activists.

“The report completely ignores Laos, a glaring omission given the country’s worsening repression,” Emilie said. “As one of the most secretive one-party states in the region, Laos continues to silence critics, suppress independent media, and expand digital surveillance, all while escaping international scrutiny.”

Although many countries in Southeast Asia have seen great economic and infrastructural development in the past decade, their focus on human rights seems to be falling short. That said, in an ever-changing world that is becoming dominated by tech and artificial intelligence, the power of resistance and a determination for human rights give people hope for a better future, Emilie added.

“People across Asia are refusing to be silenced. The HRW report paints a bleak picture—but it underestimates the power of the people and the resilience of those who continue to stand for justice. The fight for human rights is not just about survival; it is about building a future where repression does not win.”

-Asia Media Centre