Thailand is frequently portrayed as a safe haven for human rights defenders (HRDs) fleeing persecution across Southeast Asia. It functions as a space of legal limbo and heightened vulnerability, where individuals remain exposed to transnational repression (TNR), defined by OHCHR as acts conducted or directed by a State, or its proxies, to deter, silence or punish dissent, criticism or human rights advocacy expressed from outside its territory. Since Thailand’s 3rd UPR cycle, TNR has intensified sharply in scale, sophistication and visibility. Freedom House’s 2026 global data identify Thailand as the top host country in the world with the highest number of recorded incidents of physical TNR, while Southeast Asia has become a major centre of authoritarian cross-border collaboration. Thailand is therefore no longer only a country through which people seek refuge: it has become a regional operational hub for transnational repression, where foreign governments pursue dissidents, refugees, journalists and HRDs through detention, forced return, surveillance, digital targeting, intimidation, disappearance and violence.

During Thailand’s 3rd UPR cycle in November 2021, Thailand received no recommendations specifically addressing transnational repression or the protection of individuals targeted by TNR. It nevertheless received recommendations addressing related protection gaps. Thailand supported recommendations to halt the return of refugees to situations of risk (52.78), strengthen legal protection for refugees and asylum seekers (52.79), provide healthcare to migrants, refugees and asylum seekers in detention (52.70), and consider ratifying the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol (51.16). It noted recommendations calling for ratification of the Refugee Convention (52.14 and 52.15) and expansion of social welfare, including the right to work, for refugees and asylum seekers (52.80). Limited progress since the 3rd cycle includes Thailand’s ratification of the ICPPED in 2024 and the entry into force of the Prevention and Suppression of Torture and Enforced Disappearance Act B.E. 2565 (2022) in 2023, including its Section 13 prohibition of refoulement.

This represents a major change since Thailand’s 3rd UPR cycle in 2021, when TNR had not reached its current intensity and Thailand received no TNR-specific recommendations. Since then, the risk landscape has fundamentally changed: Thailand has become the world’s top recorded host country for transnational repression. UPR IV must therefore explicitly address TNR through concrete and measurable recommendations.