According to Freedom House, 25 governments were responsible for 125 incidents of physical transnational repression in 2023 alone, including assassinations, abductions, assaults, detentions, and unlawful deportations.
This statement was originally published on freedomhouse.org on 16 February 2024.
A total of 25 countries’ governments were responsible for 125 incidents of physical transnational repression last year, including the first documented cases perpetrated by the governments of Cuba, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, El Salvador, Myanmar, Sierra Leone, and Yemen.
More than 20 percent of the world’s national governments have reached beyond their borders since 2014 to forcibly silence exiled political activists, journalists, former regime insiders, and members of ethnic or religious minorities, according to new data released today by Freedom House.
The analysis finds that transnational repression – a set of physical and digital tactics used by governments to smother dissent among political exiles or diaspora communities in other countries – is a growing global problem. According to the new data, 25 countries’ governments were responsible for 125 incidents of physical transnational repression in 2023 alone, including assassinations, abductions, assaults, detentions, and unlawful deportations. The year also featured the first documented cases perpetrated by the governments of six countries: Cuba, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, El Salvador, Myanmar, Sierra Leone, and Yemen. The top five perpetrators in 2023 were the governments of Russia, Cambodia, Myanmar, Turkmenistan, and China.
Between 2014 and 2023, Freedom House has recorded a total of 1,034 direct, physical incidents of transnational repression committed by 44 origin-country governments in 100 target countries. The governments of China, Turkey, Tajikistan, Russia, and Egypt rank as the most prolific perpetrators of transnational repression overall since 2014. China’s regime on its own accounts for 25 percent of all documented incidents of transnational repression.
“Transnational repression presents a direct threat to domestic and international security, and democratic societies must work together to immediately address it. We cannot accept a world where there is no safe harbor for journalists, activists, and others who criticize repressive regimes,” said Michael J. Abramowitz, president of Freedom House. “The phenomenon of authoritarians striking down dissidents who have sought refuge abroad is not going away. Democracies will have to do more, and soon, to protect their sovereignty and their fundamental values.”
Notable cases of transnational repression from 2023 include the following:
- Agents of the Indian government were credibly accused by Canadian and US authorities of carrying out the assassination of Canada-based Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar and planning an assassination attempt against US-based Sikh activist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun.
- The Russian government was responsible for at least 18 documented incidents of transnational repression in 2023. The Kremlin targeted antiwar activists and other Russian defectors in countries including Armenia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan, with victims facing deportation, renditions, or imprisonment in the host country.
- The Cambodian government was responsible for at least 15 documented incidents of transnational repression. Four Cambodian activists were assaulted in Thailand, while eight others were detained in that country.
- The Iranian government targeted exiled journalists as part of its campaign to suppress the remnants of domestic protests triggered by the death of 22-year-old Kurdish woman Jina Mahsa Amini in 2022. London Metropolitan Police investigated serious threats against staff at the Farsi-language news channel Iran International TV, which temporarily relocated to Washington in February 2023 before returning to London with the support of British law enforcement.
Freedom House’s transnational repression database catalogs and tracks incidents dating back to 2014. While acts of transnational repression are often carried out online, using tactics such as digital intimidation, the database focuses on direct, physical incidents, including assassinations, assaults, detentions, and unlawful deportations. These likely represent only a small fraction of the total number of cases that occur. The current findings build on prior Freedom House analysis showing that journalists and international students, faculty, and scholars in the United States were major targets of transnational repression efforts.
“It’s clear that governments are not being deterred from violating sovereignty and targeting dissidents living abroad,” said Yana Gorokhovskaia, the research director for strategy and design at Freedom House. “Democracies must ensure that the perpetrators of these brutal acts face real consequences. Otherwise, the use of transnational repression is likely to spread.”
Click here to read Freedom House’s policy recommendations on transnational repression.
These analytical findings are the latest in Freedom House’s ongoing effort to document cases of transnational repression around the world. In 2021, Freedom House released the first comprehensive global survey of transnational repression, Out of Sight, Not Out of Reach, and in subsequent years released the follow-up reports Defending Democracy in Exile: Policy Responses to Transnational Repression and Still Not Safe: Transnational Repression in 2022. A Light That Cannot Be Extinguished: Exiled Journalism and Transnational Repression was released in December 2023, while Addressing Transnational Repression on Campuses in the United States was released in January 2024.
