The second day of our workshop, "From Evidence to Action: Strategic Advocacy for the UPR IV & ICCPR Reviews of Thailand", was all about shifting power. We moved from drafting factsheets to gearing up frontline human rights defenders to engage directly with diplomats. Best Chitsanupong Nithiwana, Founder of Young Pride Foundation and trans woman human rights defender, put it best about activists coming together from across Thailand: “For too long, access to diplomats has been

As the next step in our journey towards Thailand’s UPR IV this November, we gathered over 50 human rights defenders from across the country on 21 July for Day 1 of "From Evidence to Action: Strategic Advocacy for the UPR IV & ICCPR Reviews of Thailand". 🇹🇭 We built a #PeopleLedUPRMovement. We submitted the evidence. Now, it’s time to make the UN listen. Together, we are turning local evidence, lived realities, and community demands into sharp advocacy factsheets for high-le

“We know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians.” – Nelson Mandela, 1997 On this #MandelaDay, we honor Madiba not only as a symbol of resistance and reconciliation but as a fierce advocate for justice everywhere. 📢 From South Africa to Palestine, the struggle continues. Apartheid cannot be justified. Colonial violence cannot be ignored. Silence is complicity. 💚 In the spirit of Mandela’s legacy, we raise our voices: 🇵🇸🍉Free Palest

We just submitted comments on the UN's draft General Comment No. 38 on Article 22 of ICCPR (Right to Freedom of Association) This freedom was never a gift handed down by benevolent states. If anything, it was won in the streets, with the blood and sweat of workers who were fighting for equal treatment and decent wages. 🇺🇳 We submitted comments on the UN's draft General Comment No. 38 on Article 22 of ICCPR (International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights). Our message

Meta rolled out Muse Image, one of its features allows strangers to generate images from people's public Instagram photos by simply @-mentioning their public Instagram accounts, with the burden placed on the user to opt out. Meta backed down on 10 July, but only on this one specific feature as a form of PR damage control whilst Muse Image itself is still rolling out and is very much alive across Meta AI. Meta did not indicate whether it will be reintroduced again in the futur

To exist is to resist! Disability Justice IS Feminist Justice. 📣 Disability rights organiser and artist Patricia Berne reminds us, "We cannot comprehend ableism without grasping its interrelations with heteropatriarchy, white supremacy, colonialism and capitalism." 𝗙𝗲𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗶𝘀𝘁 𝗺𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀 𝗳𝗮𝗶𝗹 𝘂𝗻𝗹𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝘄𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗻𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝘆𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗺𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗱𝘂𝗰𝗲 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘄𝗲𝗮𝗽𝗼𝗻𝗶𝘇𝗲 𝗱𝗶𝘀𝗮𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 through trauma, injury, and denial of ca

Across Southeast Asia, governments are sounding the alarm over declining birth rates and an impending “demographic crisis”. But let’s not pretend the crisis is that young people are having fewer children. Just look at the world they’ve inherited: climate collapse, rising authoritarianism, unaffordable housing, stagnant wages, unpaid care burdens, and deepening inequality. ⚠️ 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗴 𝗽𝗲𝗼𝗽𝗹𝗲 𝗱𝗼 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗼𝘄𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗶𝗿 𝗴𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀 𝗵𝗶𝗴𝗵𝗲𝗿 𝗯𝗶𝗿𝘁𝗵 �

We respond to the preliminary report of the UN’s Independent International Scientific Panel on Artificial Intelligence. To say this report was a disappointment is an understatement. It gathers damning evidence that AI capital is concentrated in the hands of tech corporations, whilst vulnerable users are harmed by business models built to extract attention, labour, data and natural resources. But instead of confronting ownership and Big Tech power, the report retreats into th

On 11 June 2026, the Court of Appeal ruled that ISOC (Internal Security Operations Command) is liable for a smear campaign that targeted human rights defenders Angkhana Neelapaijit and Anchana Heemmina for years. It found ISOC had the authority to manage the website where the false content was published, and ordered it to pay 120,000 baht to Angkhana and 90,000 baht to Anchana, plus removal of the offending content. ISOC was ordered to pay compensation to both women and remov

On 6 July, peaceful protesters were met with police violence in Chiang Mai, as they called out toxic run-off from Chinese-backed mining operations in Myanmar. Members of the People's Network for the Protection of the Kok, Sai, Ruak, and Mekong Rivers gathered to deliver a letter to Chinese President Xi Jinping, demanding accountability for transboundary pollution destroying Northern Thailand’s rivers and the livelihoods of more than 70,000 households. But before they could re

On World Rural Development Day, we stand with the Sab Wai Villagers, Isaan forest-dependent communities from Chaiyaphum who have lived, farmed, and cared for the forest since the 1970s, long before their lands were declared part of Sai Thong National Park. A “green” policy that evicts rural communities and forest guardians is NOT development. It’s a false climate solution 🙅🏽‍♀️ 🇹🇭🌳 Under Thailand's Forest Reclamation Policy, 14 villagers, including nine Isaan women, were

On 29 June, we convened a panel of human rights defenders, lawyers, and digital rights experts to unpack how the UN Cybercrime Treaty is advancing transnational repression across the region – from Cambodia to Indonesia to stateless communities like the Rohingya. The surveillance industry behaves like any market under competition. Voluntary frameworks like the UN Guiding Principles carry zero consequences for companies, which is exactly why they get cited so often. The Cybercr

Justice delayed is justice denied. 🇰🇭 On 2 July 2024, Cambodia unjustly convicted Mother Nature Cambodia activists for their peaceful environmental advocacy. Five of them, Long Kunthea, Yim Leanghy, Thun Ratha, Phuon Keoraksmey, and Ly Chandaravuth, remain behind bars, serving six to eight years for “plotting” against the government. They appealed their convictions on 22 July 2024. Yet nearly two years later, their appeal hearing has been delayed, once again, with no new da

At the UN Expert Consultation on Technology and Right to Freedom of Association held in May, Manushya Foundation’s Digital Rights Advisor, Dr Jean Linis-Dinco, named the elephant in the room that many in the so-called digital rights movement refuse to acknowledge: the struggle for digital rights has been pulled into the orbit of the very corporations that profit from repression. The consultation will inform the UN Human Rights Committee’s development of General Comment No. 38

Trans rights activist Sylvia Rivera warned us decades ago: Pride without liberation become a market. As we close Pride Month 2026, we call out the corporations and elite institutions wrapping themselves in rainbows while refusing to confront the systems that keep LGBTIQ+ people unsafe, unheard, and exploited. No wonder over 37% of LGBTIQ+ people surveyed by dating app Taimi (2026) said Pride has become a “commercial event” that lost its true meaning. Yes, we celebrate Marriag