What are the most violated human rights?

There are a few different frames that this question can be viewed in. There is not a single answer, nor a list, of what human rights have been violated the most. When thinking about this question, it is important to consider different locations, different time frames, and different perspectives.

One frame that this question could be viewed from is a localization frame. People tend to answer from their own context. When searching online, it will be filtered depending on where you search from. In the United States, we tend to focus on discrimination. For example, in 2021, President Biden issued an executive order that established the White House Gender Policy Council. This council has listed goals including the following: (i) combat systemic biases and discrimination, including sexual harassment, and to support women’s human rights; (ii) increase economic security and opportunity by addressing the structural barriers to women’s participation in the labor force and by decreasing wage and wealth gaps; (iii) address the caregiving needs of American families and support the care-workers they depend upon; (iv) support gender equity and combat gender stereotypes in education, including promoting participation in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields; (v) promote gender equity in leadership (Exec. Order No. 14020, 2021) The focus on discrimination in the United States shows the power differential between the United States and many other countries. While no human rights issue is unimportant, we in the U.S. are able to focus on problems such as discrimination, while many others are concerned about very different issues. In South Sudan, government security forces and armed groups committed many human rights violations, including killings, detention, acts of sexual violence, torture, abductions, the recruitment and use of children, and destruction of civilian property. Another frame to look at human rights violations from is from a certain time period, such as the last 500 years. One such violation is the genocide of native peoples. For example, when settlers from Europe came to the Americas, the population of Native Americans dropped from 10 million to under 300,000. Many Native Americans were seen as subhuman due to not being Chrisitians. A variety of tactics were used in this genocide, one of which was the distribution of blankets from smallpox patients to Native Americans in the late 1800s. On November 3, 1755 Council and Lieutenant Governor Spencer Phips approved a law passed by the Massachusetts House of Representatives that declared the people of the Penobscot tribe to be enemies, rebels, and traitors. He offered rewards for bringing in scalps of those in the Penobscot tribe, with the highest reward being for males over the age of 12, and the lowest being for children. In the 1830s, Native Americans were forced off of the land that they had been occupying for decades and forced to walk across the Mississippi River to a new territory that was designated for them. This trek, often called the Trail of Tears, left thousands of Native Americans dead. Violations of human rights during European colonization of the Americas did not stop at genocide. Colonialism includes economic exploitation of another country. In 1663 King Charles II ordered the colonial British Empire seize all the land of Native Peoples between 31 and 36 degrees latitude from coast to coast. In the 1740s the Earl of Granville was given Durham County, which is now northern North Carolina (26,000 square miles) by King George II of England. Many natives’ land were carved into parcels and sold to English settlers. The Durham land had rich, fertile soil, and the settlers began reusing the soil without rest, fertilization, crop rotation, replenishment or erosion prevention, resulting in diminished yields. In addition to economic exploitation, other violations were occurring through these processes as well. The land cultivation occuring in Durham County was helped by West African people, who were forcefully taken from their homeland from the 1500s through the 1800s and enslaved to do farm labor. Additionally, millions of Native Americans were enslaved during this time period. Many of them were shipped to locations including Barbados, Bermuda, Jamaica, the Azores, Spain and Tangier in North Africa. This allowed them to remove Native Americans from the land to allow more European settlement, and for them to make money from the sales. Effects of this enslavement were long lasting, with Native Americans’ children and grandchildren often becoming indentured servants in European households. Many human rights were violated during wars that occurred over this time period. During World War I, which lasted from 1914 to 1918. For example, the Imperial German Government deported about 100,000 men, women and children from Belgium and France who were then used as forced labor in Germany. Additionally, many Belgians and French were held as hostages and many died in captivity. Millions of soldiers were also held as prisoners of war. Many of these POWs were held in harsh and inhumane conditions. They were forced into labor, beaten, and killed. Another violation was the bombing or other damage done to hospitals of the Red Cross and Red Crescent, along with hospital ships, healthcare workers, vehicles, and supplies. Directing attacks against Red Cross personnel, buildings or vehicles, is a war crime. World War II (1939-1945) is one of the most well known and horrendous human rights violations in world history. Similar to World War II, but far more extreme, about 12,000,000 people were removed from their homes in Nazi Germany and forced into labor, often in munitions factories. This same practice occurred in Japan on a smaller scale. There was a mass genocide of various groups of people, including Jews, ethnic Poles, Roma, people with disabilities, and more. They were sent to concentration camps, and many were killed via gas chambers, mass shootings, or being deprived of necessities such as food or warmth. Another well known example of human rights violation was the system apartheid in South Africa, which lasted from 1948 to 1990. This was a system that, on paper, intended to keep Black South Africans and White South Africans separated but living in equal conditions. In practice, Black South Africans were severely discriminated against and subject to harsh conditions and treatment. Various laws were passed that perpetuated this discrimination. For example, the Population Registration Act of 1950 required people to register according to their racial group, and people were treated differently depending on that group. The Group Areas Act of 1950 required people be moved into set areas for their race group, and many people were forcibly removed from their homes. The Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act allowed for those who had romantic relationships outside of their racial group to be arrested, and often subject to violence. Black South Africans were killed, beaten, and subjugated as second class citizens for over 50 years. Violations have continued to occur into the 21st century, but for the purpose of this question I will end with this overview of some of the most major violations that occurred up until this point. Violations that have happened since and are still happening now can be the subject of another essay.

Human rights violations of the 21st Century In March of 2003, a Coalition consisting of countries including the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, invaded Iraq with the goal of removing President Saddam Hussein from power. The Iraqi government was accused by the U.S. government of holding Weapons of Mass Destruction and having ties to terrorist groups. The UN did not authorize this invasion, as it had done its own search for weapons of mass destruction and found no evidence of their presence in Iraq. This means that the invasion of Iraq in itself was a violation of international law. It falls under the definition of an act of aggression by the US. However, the US then declared it to be a national interest issue.. The invasion was successful, Saddam Hussein was removed from power, and the U.S. implemented a transitional authority known as the Coalition Provisional Authority. An insurgency then formed of many who were loyal to Saddam. Another violation that occurred during the Iraq war was the amount of civilian deaths. Many civilians were killed and injured by aerial bombing, suicide attacks gunshots, shelling, and fires started by bombing. Iraqi citizens have also suffered due to malnutrition and economic hardship caused by US sanctions against Iraq, and the war worsened the situation. There have been between At least 300,00 Iraqi civilians, many being women and children, were killed. Additionally, the treatment of prisoners and detainees in Iraq was horrendous. The Abu Ghraib prison was originally known for its poor conditions while under the control of Saddam Hussein, but then was taken over by the U.S. and used to house prisoners who were suspected to be part of the insurgency. It was revealed that many human rights abuses took place in Abu Ghraib at the hands of the U.S. Military. The U.S. even created their own category of “unlawful combatants” that they classified these individuals under in order to justify this treatment and indefinite detention. The investigators claimed to use advanced interrogation techniques, but in reality, tortured many Iraqi individuals. Some of these techniques included holding stress positions, such as the push-up position, for extended periods of time, forced nudity in freezing conditions, sleep deprivation, and physical and sexual assault, and the beginning of the practice of waterboarding. Abu Grahib was not the only location of this type of treatment; in other U.S.-led detention facilities, similar abuses were occurring. There was also evidence that the U.S. knew about this treatment and did not do anything to stop it. Another example of human rights abuses that have occurred in the 21st century have been during the proxy wars in Libya, Syria, and Yemen. There have been a variety of conflicts with multiple groups attempting to gain control, and multiple countries have influenced these wars by providing military and financial support. There were many civilian casualties caused during these conflicts. In Syria, illegal ground attacks and aerial attacks on civilians were carried out by Russian and Syrian governments. They also destroyed resources for civilians such as water stations and camps for internally displaced people. Similar attacks occurred in Yemen and Libya despite a ceasefire agreement and national ceasefire.

Another invasion that was internationally condemned was Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. When the Soviet Union fell in 1991, Ukraine expressed interest in becoming part of the European Union and strengthening their ties with the west. Russia was opposed to this, as they considered Ukraine to essentially still be a part of Russia. In 2014, Ukraine announced plans to sign an association agreement with the EU, and then backed out due to pressure from Russia. Ukrainians were very upset by this, and a large movement of protests known as the Euromaiden protests began. The pro-Russian president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, is forced to flee the country. Later, Russia annexes Crimea, claiming it as part of their historical territory, and tensions rise even more. In Eastern Ukraine, two pro-Russian separatist groups form, the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People's Republic (LPR), and declare themselves independent. The conflict between the Ukrainian government and these groups, supported by Russia, became known as the Donbas War. In 2014 and 2015, the Minsk agreements were signed ordering a ceasefire, but were essentially ignored. In 2022, former German Chancellor Angela Merkel stated that the Minsk agreements really only served as a way to buy Ukraine time to rearm themselves. In Ukraine’s further efforts to connect with the west, they expressed interest in joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Russia was threatened by this, as they did not want NATO in close proximity to them. In February of 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine under the justification of “demilitarizing and denazifying Ukraine” and end the supposed genocide of Russian speakers in Ukranian territory- mostly of those who make up the DPR and LPR. These attacks were indiscriminate, and caused many civilian deaths. It was a large violation of international humanitarian law. Although Russia had more “sound” reasoning for their invasion than the U.S. did for Iraq, the media produced by the U.S more clearly covered the wrongs done by Russia than the wrongs done by the U.S. Media coverage, and therefore often public perception, is often altered by the political climate of the country it comes from.