From Azerbaijan to China, Burma, Sudan or Belarus: human rights defenders are imprisoned for documenting state executed or sponsored violence ⚡️ Add your name to the @civicusalliance.bsky.social petition calling for their release. We at Notes from the Faultline definitively endorse it.

Nigeria's civic space crackdown has outgrown the newsroom: the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism documented 245 violations in 2025 and ordinary citizens were affected in 54.3% of them 🇳🇬 What happens in Africa's most populous country must be of concern to all of us around the globe⚡️

Nothing to add.

On 4 April, fighters abducted 21 children in northeastern DRC. The radio network built to warn villages is going dark⚫️ Abrupt US aid cuts gutted a programme linking 98 communities; 36 are cut off. Trump & Musk created a major security risk ⚡️ @friendsofusaid.bsky.social

Russia deployed tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus 🇷🇺☢️🇧🇾 The US-Russia nuclear arms control treaty has expired 🇺🇸☢️🇷🇺 Across Europe and the Pacific, nations are accelerating rearmament. The calculation that underpinned post-Cold War security has unravelled. @newstatesman1913.bsky.social

Five years ago today, #Belarus began one of Europe's most sweeping crackdowns on civil society. On July 23, 2021, the regime filed to dissolve more than 50 NGOs in one day. Since 2020, at least 2,044 non-profit organizations have been liquidated.

Aliyev says Azerbaijan may quit the Council of Europe, and @coe.int Secretary General quoted having phoned him asking Baku to stay ⚡️ 🇪🇺-membership shouldn't turn on backdoor calls. ➡️ Release the political prisoners; show a credible reform roadmap.

Sudanese researcher and analyst Hamid Khalafallah spent his life documenting a counterrevolutionary war the world keeps reducing to a humanitarian crisis. He has died, and Sudan's war has not ⚡️ His writing on @timep.bsky.social remains a record of what the world chose not to see.

In 2022, von der Leyen told Baku its full potential required free, independent media. Azerbaijan then jailed the journalists of AbzasMedia, Toplum TV and Meydan TV. In 2026, @vonderleyen.ec.europa.eu returned and said nothing⚡️ The EU's price for gas is silence.

The assault on democracy, imprisonment of opposition, persecution of lawyers and civil society is happening in Türkiye in total silence of the @coe.int. ➡️ “The Council of Europe is being tested”: www.linkedin.com/pulse/three-...

Three countries, three contexts, one faultline: the Council of Europe is being tested

Anar Mammadli won the Václav Havel Human Rights Prize in 2014 for monitoring elections. Today he sits in an Azerbaijani prison, his earlier conviction (which the European Court of Human Rights ruled w...

linkedin.com

Anne Applebaum@anneapplebaum.wsocial.eu · 4w ago

As NATO gathers in Ankara, Erdogan completes the destruction of Turkish democracy giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

150+ human rights defenders and experts undertaking joint real-time human rights policy analysis and strategic coordination 💪 50 recommendations 🧐 61 human rights themes ⚖️ ➡️ Check out our Human Rights Compass Database: progresschange.org/human-rights...

Russia's Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, announced four new embassies in Africa in one speech: Gambia, Liberia, Togo and the Comoros 🇷🇺🇬🇲🇱🇷🇹🇬🇰🇲 A third Russia-Africa summit is set for Moscow in October. The partnership on offer is built on arms and mercenaries, not democratic accountability ⚡️

With heat waves shattering temperature records across the globe, leading to needless deaths, let me just say that history will not look fondly on those who put fossil fuel profits above saving the planet.

Seven years of EU Rule of Law Reports. Governments that ignore them still face no consequences ⚡️ On 15 July the Commission publishes the seventh. @icjurists.bsky.social and 36 organisations want it to bite: EU funds tied to the rule of law. @article19europe.bsky.social @epd.eu @amnesty.org

Council of Europe: the institutional tools exist to address situations in Azerbaijan, Georgia and Türkiye, including invoking Article 52 by the Secretary General. The will to use them remains the question ⚡

28 June 1969: The Stonewall Inn, New York. One year later, Pride marches began. Today, as gender equality faces coordinated attack in the US and globally, we stand with LGBTQ people, their rights defenders, and all resisting. The right to live openly is not negotiable 🌈

28 June 1969: Stonewall. Patrons resisted. One year on, the first Pride march set out. What began as a demand for dignity is marked today in over 100 countries. Human rights are universal. We stand with LGBTQ people and their human rights defenders everywhere. The work continues 🌈

The Council of Europe's Parliamentary Assembly examined democratic backsliding in Georgia, Serbia, Azerbaijan. It asks the Secretary General @alain-berset.coe.int to use Article 52 on 🇦🇿 and 🇬🇪. The leadership has not acted. That gap is the faultline ⚡️ www.linkedin.com/pulse/three-...

Three countries, three contexts, one faultline: the Council of Europe is being tested

Anar Mammadli won the Václav Havel Human Rights Prize in 2014 for monitoring elections. Today he sits in an Azerbaijani prison, his earlier conviction (which the European Court of Human Rights ruled w...

linkedin.com

Azerbaijan's prison system is weaponised against political opposition, states @pace.coe.int in its resolution ⚠️ Escalating sentences, deliberate psychological isolation, prison conditions used to punish reveal a state gripped by fear of its own population. ➡️ Parliamentarians call for action.

A quarter. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Nearly a quarter of voters in Europe now back far-right parties

Analysis by more than 150 political scientists finds proportion who back such parties has increased nearly fivefold since 1995

theguardian.com

Credibility crisis at the Council of Europe: the human rights defenders and lawyers who built their lives on its values now doubt the institution's capacity to defend them. What institutional recovery looks like will have to be at the heart of its New Democratic Pact for Europe ⚖️

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe is this week looking into Türkiye, Serbia, Georgia and Azerbaijan. Different contexts, different realities 🇹🇷🇷🇸🇬🇪🇦🇿 Same consequences: opposition silenced, civil society under attack, media curtailed. Same inaction by @coe.int leadership ⚠️

An issue that is getting too little attention: civic space at the Council of Europe ⚡️ Over the years, access for NGOs the facilities has become more and more burdensome. Possibilities to interact with political bodies has reduced. These times demand more participation, not less 🇪🇺

The world's strongest regional human rights system is being tested from inside ⚖️ This week, we at @faultlinenotes.bsky.social stay with the Council of Europe📍 Can @coe.int and does it still want to answer democratic backsliding by its own members and protect the human rights defenders? ⤵️

Putin calls Trump ahead of the G7: 1️⃣ Trump promises Putin he will shape the G7 position on Ukraine. 2️⃣ Putin's foreign affairs sbire announces this publicly. 3️⃣ Trump flies to Évian-les-Bains. ➡️ This is what a handler relationship looks like ⚡️

While Morocco is playing Brazil, don't forget Betty. LGBT+ activist Ibtissame "Betty" Lachgar remains imprisoned and needs urgent medical care. secure.avaaz.org/campaign/en/...

Morocco: #FreeBetty

Betty is suffering in solitary confinement simply for wearing a t-shirt the Moroccan authorities didn’t like. She is innocent, and she is sick. Bone cancer has eaten away at her arm, and doctors warn ...

secure.avaaz.org

Imprisoned in Morocco for her human rights advocacy, Ibtissame "Betty" Lachgar is a bone cancer survivor being denied the urgent specialist surgical care she needs 🇲🇦 @irct.bsky.social assessed Morocco's denial of medical care in custody as torture under international law.

Germany and France want to squash the Europe's foreign service @eudiplomacy.bsky.social ⚡️ Europe is now debating structures, mandates, reorganisation. The debate should be about Europe's foreign policy compass ⤵️

What might be the cherry on the cake is the “thank you darling” at the end, said with such disdain, disrespect and disregard to a prominent and highly respected journalist. @kwelkernbc.bsky.social

Jon Cooper@joncooper-us.bsky.social · 2mo ago

🚨Trump has a complete MELTDOWN on Meet the Press. Kristen Welker presses him on his wild California election conspiracies. Trump calls her crooked, calls the press crooked, and throws a tantrum about how unfair everything is. Then he storms out mid-interview like a toddler who lost at recess. 🍼🤣

We really value politicians involved on climate, environment and human rights 🌻 But: what @coe.int is truly problematic: in an article about the 1st Forum on Environmental Human Rights Defenders, the Council of Europe names, credits, recognises no human rights defender. Only mentioning officials ⚠️