THE ADVOCATE 537
VOL. 79 PART 4 JULY 2021
discriminatory lockdowns that prohibit people from leaving their
homes even to obtain food or go to work, and even to curb humanitarian
interventions into areas afflicted by COVID-19;
• Iran, where human rights lawyers and other defenders, particularly
women human rights defenders, continue to experience judicial
harassment and arbitrary detention;
• Malaysia, where LRWC welcomed news that global advocacy by
dozens of human rights organizations, including LRWC, resulted in
the withdrawal of contempt of court charges against a Malaysian
human rights lawyer and eight environmental rights defenders in
a case involving villagers’ protests against negative impacts of logging
on community livelihoods and on the environment;
• Myanmar (discussed in the May 2021 edition of the Advocate),
where the military junta has since its coup on February 1, 2021
extrajudicially killed hundreds of people and arbitrarily detained
thousands, including numerous human rights advocates;
• the Philippines, where dozens of lawyers and other human rights
defenders have been murdered with impunity since the Duterte
government took power in 2016;
• Russia, where lawyer Ivan Pavlov, who represents Aleksei
Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation and others wrongly accused
in “extremism” cases, was arbitrarily detained in April 2021;
• Thailand, where human rights advocates regularly experience
judicial harassment and arbitrary detention, and where the government
has proposed a new law on non-profit associations with
vague and overbroad provisions that could dramatically shrink the
space for dissent and human rights advocacy; and
• the United States, where LRWC interventions focused on U.S.
harassment of personnel of the International Criminal Court,3 as
well as issues of grave human rights violations within the U.S. justice
system, including systemic racist police violence.4
In addition, LRWC issued a new publication on the international law and
standards pertaining to the right to counsel. This 156-page publication is
available free of charge on LRWC’s website.5
The year 2020 and the first half of 2021 have posed an urgent challenge
to human rights advocates and to all those who uphold the rule of law.
LRWC expresses appreciation for its members and donors for their support
of LRWC, without which LRWC volunteers could not continue to do their
work.