Washington says human rights ‘backsliding’ worldwide

Human rights are still in decline around the world, as shown by the war in Ukraine, the US government said on Tuesday.

“Many years running, we have seen an alarming recession of democracy, the rule of law, respect for human rights in many parts of the world," Secretary of State Antony Blinken said while presenting his agency's annual report on human rights to the press.

Since the last report was released a year ago, "that backsliding has, unfortunately, continued," Blinken said.

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He pointed to Russia's "brutal war" in Ukraine as one of the most stark illustrations of that decline, again accusing Moscow's forces of "widespread atrocities" in the areas they have occupied.

“The bodies, hands bound, left on streets; theaters, train stations, apartment buildings, reduced to rubble, with civilians inside,” Blinken said.

A child from Ukraine is pictured in a bus at the Palanca-Maiaky-Udobne border between Moldova and Ukraine. AFP

“We hear it in the testimonies of women and girls who've been raped, and the besieged civilians, starving and freezing to death.”

Blinken denounced human rights violations in other major US opponents, again accusing China of perpetrating a “genocide” against Uyghur Muslims and the Taliban of increasing the "arbitrary detentions of women, protesters and journalists" since they rushed back to power in Afghanistan in August.

But he also criticized the actions of some of Washington's allies, such as Egypt, which he slammed for the imprisonment of lawyer and human rights activist Mohamed Al Baqer; and Ethiopia, where Blinken said "all parties to the country's conflict... have committed atrocities" and where "thousands of Ethiopians are being unjustly detained in life-threatening conditions."

Blinken rejected criticism from human rights organisations that believe Joe Biden's administration, which says it centers its foreign policy around human rights, is not putting enough pressure on certain US allies.

"Whether a country is a friend or one with which we have real differences, the measuring stick we apply is the same," he said.

"That reflects a core principle of human rights: they're universal."

Agence France-Presse