Support to human rights defenders at the community level

A significant part of our work is about strengthening rights holders’ possibilities to organise and stand up against violence and oppression in a worsening context. We support dozens of human rights defender groups from different religious, ethnic and geographical origins across Myanmar, reaching about 10 000 community members annually in areas controlled by both junta and resistance forces.

We are helping them stay safe and continue their work and we support their efforts to organise and mobilise local communities around human rights. It has proven to be an efficient strategy to reclaim and expand democratic space and defy violence and oppression. We are struck by how our partners continue to find ways to use the limited space available to push back against abuses, even in the most tightly controlled areas in central Myanmar. Under conditions of significant and ongoing risk, they remain highly active, sustaining daily work, and delivering tangible and significant results. These include strengthened protection for activists and communities, return of confiscated land, improvements in social services and exposure of corrupt officials.