(BANGKOK, March 2022)—Between January and March 2022, Fortify Rights secured 49 grants totaling more than US$200,000 in emergency relief funds to directly support human rights defenders at risk and their families. The grants, obtained from eight different emergency funding mechanisms, provided critical support to human rights defenders facing reprisals by the Myanmar junta following the February 1, 2021 coup as well as Rohingya refugees facing threats by non-state actors operating in the Cox’s Bazar District refugee camp. Recipients of the grants include former Myanmar government officials, members of workers’ and students’ unions, members of civil society groups, church leaders, journalists, political prisoners, and others known by the Myanmar junta as well as Rohingya refugee human rights defenders. The grants helped ensure safe relocations, access legal support and medical assistance, and other critical resources for human rights defenders and their families.
Since the coup in Myanmar on February 1, 2021, Fortify Rights has secured nearly US$667,565 in emergency assistance to support more than 530 human rights defenders and their families facing security risks due to their human rights activism.