15th Meeting 61st Session of Human Rights Council
Description
- ITEM 3: Interactive dialogue with the Special Rapporteur on human rights defenders
Mr. President,
Right Livelihood delivers this statement on behalf of human rights defenders currently living in exile from Belarus, Nicaragua, Iran, Russia, China, Guatemala, Myanmar, Cambodia, and Afghanistan, reflecting the expanding global reality of exile within today’s civic space landscape.
For many defenders, exile is not protection, but displacement under pressure. Engagement with international mechanisms and peaceful human rights work increasingly leads to forced relocation, continued surveillance, and reprisals. Defenders often face precarious legal status, economic insecurity, and isolation, all while striving to continue their work. Exile does not mark the end of repression; rather, it represents a transformation of risk.
Despite these challenges, defenders remain active. Yet without structural support, exile is becoming an erosion of civic space beyond borders. Protection responses remain fragmented, reactive, and insufficient to address exile as a long-term condition of human rights defense.
Mr. President,
We thank the Special Rapporteur for her important work advancing the protection of human rights defenders, and we hope her successor will continue to address the growing risks and realities of exile. In this spirit, we call on the mandate to consider preparing a dedicated thematic report on human rights defenders in exile, outlining concrete pathways towards durable protection frameworks.
Special Rapporteur, as exile becomes an increasingly common consequence of civic engagement, how does your mandate envision strengthening long-term systems that ensure defenders in exile can remain protected, visible, and safely engaged?
Thank you.
SPEAKER
Right Livelihood Award Foundation, Ms. Mariel Merayo Ramirez
Source:
UN Web TV, 15th Meeting – 61st Session of Human Rights Council, https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k14/k14y17brn9
