Amnesty warns of the "Trump effect": impunity and censorship accelerate the authoritarian drift

BarcelonaThe arrival of Donald Trump to the White House has had devastating effects on human rights and freedoms around the world, according to Amnesty International's (AI) annual report, which warns of an acceleration of the repressive drift. "He is wasting decades of painstaking work to build and promote universal human rights," the organization laments.

The report published this Tuesday, which analyzes the state of human rights in more than 150 countries around the world, points out that Trump's emergence on the international scene has generated impunity among world leaders., has fueled authoritarian tendencies and has emptied international safeguards of content. "Year after year, we have warned of the danger of human rights regression. But the events of the last twelve months—especially The genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza, broadcast live but ignored—have highlighted how hellish the world can be for so many people when the most powerful states ignore international law and dispense with multilateral institutions,” warns Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International. Callamard believes that Trump has shown “absolute contempt for human rights” in his first 100 days in office. we are in the midst of a historic transition that has been brewing for some time. The current situation is the consequence of “systematic, deliberate and targeted” decisions taken over the past ten years, which are now converging into nothing less than “an epochal change.”

Gaza, Ukraine and Sudan

The report vehemently denounces the Gaza war, which he calls a "live-streamed genocide" and, above all, the complicity of the United States and most European states when it comes to ignoring compliance with international law in the enclave. He also accuses Russia to bomb civilian infrastructure in Ukraine, in attacks that killed more civilians than the previous year, and illegally tried dozens of Ukrainian prisoners of war. But the world's biggest displacement crisis has been in the Sudan, where thousands of people have died as victims of conflict or famine, "in the face of almost absolute global indifference."

Those who can raise awareness of these rights violations in conflict zones, journalists, have also been affected by this setback. At least 124 media professionals were killed in 2024, according to the NGO Committee to Protect Journalists. Two-thirds of which are in Gaza at the hands of Israel. And if that weren't enough, at least 21 states have introduced laws or bills to suppress freedom of expression or ban media outlets.

Repression has also been seen in mass arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances, and often excessive use of force to suppress civil disobedience, as has happened in the student protests in Bangladesh, in the protests following the controversial elections in Mozambique and in the Demonstrations against the arrest of the Turkish opposition leader, details the entity.

Another element that the report takes into consideration is The Trump administration's massive cuts in foreign humanitarian aid, that have forced the closure of hospitals and medical aid programs or refugee camps and have seriously affected countries such as Myanmar, Syria and Yemen. Amnesty also does not ignore the The racist and xenophobic drift of many states in blaming migrants and refugees for crime and economic stagnation, fueled by the current US administration. And it focuses on "the global rollback of gender justice" spurred by the dismantling of initiatives that address discrimination and attacks on the rights of transgender people. In this regard, it points out the draconian prohibitions that women suffer in Afghanistan and in Iran and the repression against the LGBTI community in Georgia and Bulgaria.

But the organization also sounds a note of optimism about the possibility of establishing accountability through international justice. In this regard, it welcomes the lawsuit filed by South Africa against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), on a charge of genocide. Amnesty International hails the warrants issued against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas military leader Mohammed al-Masri for war crimes as a "historic milestone." has sanctioned the ICJ and Netanyahu has received in Washington, due to the rebound effect it can have on other countries.

To put an end to this authoritarian drift, Amnesty is turning to the power of the citizenry. One fact it considers decisive is that the election year of 2024, in which there have been 64 elections worldwide, there was no "overwhelming victory for forces opposed to human rights." On the contrary, the majority of citizens voted in favor of "taking another path and thus demonstrating that the rise of authoritarian practices is not inevitable, that it can be fought," the NGO celebrates.