Tanzania
President Samia Suluhu Hassan and the ruling Party of the Revolution (CCM) have stepped up repression of political opposition and civil society in the run-up to the October 2025 general elections. In April, CCM disqualified the main opposition party, Chadema, from participating in the elections and charged its leader, Tundu Lissu, with treason. Maria Sarungi Tsehai is a Tanzanian human-rights activist, journalist, and founder of two prodemocracy organizations. Her speech “No Retreat, No Surrender,” which she gave at the 2025 Oslo Freedom Forum on May 26, is excerpted below:
I never imagined that a weekly hair appointment could turn into the most terrifying experience of my lifetime. Every week, I go to the same hair salon in Nairobi, Kenya. But on the twelfth of January, 2025, as I was leaving the salon, a black van pulled up in front of my Uber. Armed, masked men jumped out, dragged me out of the vehicle, and tried to put me into the van. I resisted. . . . I knew I had to fight and cause a scene.
The single strongest emotion that I had was anger. I kept hearing in my head the voice of my friend . . . “Do not be carried off like a sack of rice.” . . . Now, while in the van, these abductors claimed that they were from the Kenyan police, but I have no doubt in my mind that they were working on behalf of the government of Tanzania — the same government that I had fled to seek safety in Kenya. . . .
You may ask: Why would the government of Tanzania want to disappear me? Because I refuse to be silent. . . .
And I speak not just for myself. I speak for the countless Tanzanians who refuse to be bullied into silence. For the past few years, I’ve been speaking in international forums, on social media, telling anyone who would listen about a chilling pattern of enforced disappearances and abductions targeting the critics of President Samia Suluhu Hassan in Tanzania.
Between March 2021 and August 2024, [a colleague] and I compiled eighty cases of politically motivated abductions that happened. In more than half of these, the victims were never seen again. Let me quickly give you four cases:
Deusdedith Soka, a youth leader who was well-known to organize peaceful protests . . . disappeared a few days after he wrote that he had been threatened by the police.
Ali Kibao, a senior Chadema security adviser: He was taken off the bus at night by armed men. The next day, his body was found mutilated. His face had acid thrown at it, and his eyes, gouged out.
Shadrack Chaula, an artist who was jailed for a viral TikTok video in which he burned the picture of Samia Suluhu Hassan. A month after his release, men showed up saying they were government officials, shoved him in a white SUV — never seen again.
Oriais Oleng’iyo, an elder, 85-year-old Maasai, who was wounded during the altercations in the violent evictions in northern Tanzania. His family saw he was taken away by security forces, never seen again. . . .
Let us understand this: The goal is simple — instill fear, silence dissent, and suppress the opposition ahead of the October elections.
We have been ruled by the same political party since independence. Even though in 1992 we transitioned into a so-called multiparty democracy, our laws remain stuck in the past. The president, for example, still appoints administrators, judges, and even electoral commissioners. And you have dissenters arrested, newspapers shut down, NGOs deregistered, and peaceful protest is met with violence.
John Pombe Magufuli turned our flawed democracy into a dictatorship. After his death, many hoped that his successor, Samia Suluhu, would bring reform and chart a new course. And maybe for a moment, she did. There was hype around the fact that she was the first female president of Tanzania — as if that was a qualification on its own. . . .
I didn’t buy into the hype. In fact, I saw the red flags. I kept telling everyone: Without fundamental, important change through action, the talk about reform is just that — talk.
Unfortunately, my warning went unheeded. I was dubbed a hater, even though I persistently pointed out atrocities committed by security forces. . . . Not only has [President Hassan] continued the repression, she has utilized and normalized enforced disappearance as a political tool.
She is the only president in Tanzanian history to have charged her two main opponents with major offenses. Freeman Mbowe in 2021 was charged with terrorism. . . . This year, Tundu Lissu, who is the head of the main opposition party Chadema, is sitting in jail charged with treason just because he demanded electoral reforms. . . .
Our demands are clear. We want a new democratic constitution. We want to dismantle the machinery of fear. We want a new social contract — one that will bury the legacy of a one-party state and restore the dignity of the people of Tanzania.
Tanzania belongs to its people — not to those who terrorize them. And this is not just about Tanzania. Authoritarianism is on the rise all around the world. If we do not unite — they win.
So we ask: Speak out. Stand with us. Help us. Help us reclaim Tanzania. We are not victims. No, we are not. We are a movement. And we shall not be bullied.
Turkey
Ekrem İmamoğlu is mayor of Istanbul, standard-bearer of the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s biggest political challenger. He was detained in March on dubious charges of corruption and terrorism, which sparked mass protests around the country. Excerpts of a letter he sent from prison to be read at the “People Stand Up for Their Will” rally in Silivri on May 14 appear in translation below:
You know that over the past six years, we’ve done so much for Silivri. We stood by our low-income citizens and our farmers. With major investments and brand-new services, we improved and beautified every aspect of life in Silivri. While we focused on protecting Silivri’s natural and historical heritage and developing its agricultural and tourism potential, the government was busy filling Silivri’s prison. . . .
They are trying to turn the country into a prison for anyone who speaks the truth, demands their rights, and calls for freedom and justice. They only tolerate an opposition that stays within the lines they draw — and one that can never win an election. This government, which grants freedom only to itself and has lost its sense of justice, cannot bring peace or prosperity to Turkey.
We set out on this path to create a just Turkey, where everyone feels free, and where no one’s freedom harms another. . . . For years, I’ve battled conspiracies and slander. I am not afraid of being investigated or prosecuted. But there’s one person who is terrified — even of the idea that I might be tried without arrest. I ask Mr. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan: When you were mayor of Istanbul, you were tried for charges similar to the ones I face today — but you were never detained, not even for a day. Even when you were convicted and sentenced, you were tried without pretrial detention.
So why don’t the same rules apply now that I’m on trial? Are you afraid that if I’m released . . . I’ll be on the streets, in the squares, looking people in the eye and telling them the truth? . . .
A government that has lost its sense of justice is like a building with no foundation — it will definitely fall. We will build a just Turkey where not a single person is imprisoned unfairly, where even those who have committed the gravest crimes are judged fairly, and where no criminal goes unpunished. We will ensure that justice prevails — not just in the courthouses, but on the streets, in markets, in workplaces, schools, and hospitals — for everyone, everywhere.
We will ensure fairness in income, taxation, opportunities, and access. In a free and just country, we will connect with each other more deeply, and we will become a much stronger nation together. Believe in yourselves. You are the rightful owners of this country. Governments come and go, but the people remain. The people are greater.
Venezuela
President Nicolás Maduro blatantly stole the country’s 28 July 2024 presidential election and has since intensified his political crackdown. Members of the opposition have been in hiding for a year. Juan Pablo Guanipa is a prominent opposition activist and close ally of opposition leader María Corina Machado. He was kidnapped and arrested on May 23 on charges of terrorism. A prerecorded video message was published to his social-media accounts upon his arrest. Translated excerpts follow:
Brothers and sisters, if you’re reading this, it’s because I have been kidnapped by the forces of Nicolás Maduro’s regime. . . .
This is a kidnapping driven by one reason alone: the regime’s fear of the Venezuelan people. . . .
The regime will never break the Venezuelan spirit of freedom and . . . despite years of trying to crush us, we Venezuelans will never abandon our democratic DNA.
That’s why they kidnap and intimidate. Fear is all they have left. Venezuela is too great for them, and they hide behind brutality and cruelty to stay in power.
During these months in hiding . . . the images of Venezuelans defending the vote on July 28 in the face of the regime’s mobs, and the videos of our people rising up on July 29, fueled my determination to keep fighting. And that same bravery is what I hope will keep me strong in this new stage of the fight.
Although the regime may see today as a “victory” (as if kidnapping a Venezuelan were some great achievement), I am more certain than ever that the final victory will be ours — the Venezuelan people’s.
I don’t know what will happen to me in the coming hours, days, or weeks. But what I do know for sure is that we will win the long fight against dictatorship.
The day will come soon when we’ll be running through the streets, not fleeing from repression, but to embrace one another and celebrate freedom.
The day will come soon when we’ll go to the airports, not to say goodbye to our homeland, but to welcome back our brothers, children, and friends who are returning home.
The day will come soon when Venezuelans will go to the prisons, not as hostages, but to free the political prisoners.
The day will come soon when democracy won’t be a fantasy, but our reality.
To my fellow Venezuelans: Let’s continue our fight for freedom. Don’t believe that freedom is impossible or that they are invincible. That is a lie from the regime. Let’s keep resisting, each from our own trench, because only we Venezuelans can free Venezuela.
Today I am unjustly imprisoned, but never defeated.
Long live a free Venezuela.
Russia
Nineteen-year-old Darya Kozyreva was sentenced to two years and eight months in prison for “discrediting” the Russian army after speaking out against the war in Ukraine and pasting a poem by Taras Shevchenko onto a statue of the Ukrainian poet in St. Petersburg. She presented her final court statement on April 18, which was published and translated by Mediazona. Excerpts follow:
There’s a striking feature in Russian history: No matter who holds power — whether czars or communists — their regime seems governed by a kind of religion that forbids them from simply leaving Ukraine alone. The rulers might wear different outfits, but they’re all cut from the same cloth. . . .
No one ever gave them the right to define Ukraine’s past or future. They fail to see that Ukrainians don’t need any “big brother,” and certainly not the fantasy of a so-called “unified Russian popular trinity.”
Ukraine is a free country, a free nation. It will decide its own future . . . . It will choose its own path. Who to call a friend or a brother, and who to name as a bitter enemy. It will determine how to treat its history. And most certainly, it will choose which language to speak.
I know these should be obvious things. But they’re not. It’s clear that Putin can’t get his head around the fact that Ukraine is a sovereign nation. Then again, there’s a lot he can’t seem to grasp — like human rights or democratic principles.
Even those who oppose Putin’s regime don’t always understand this. They don’t always realize that Ukraine, having paid for its sovereignty in blood, will determine its own future. I still want to believe that when democracy finally reaches Russia, sooner or later, this attitude will change. I want to believe in a beautiful future where Russia lets go of all imperial ambition, whether overt and bloodthirsty or hidden deep in the human psyche. . . .
What [Putin] wants, really, is a meek and submissive Malorossia, or “Little Russia.” Ideally, a province with no will of its own. A place that obeys his every word, speaks a foreign tongue, and slowly forgets its own. Somewhere along the way, he miscalculated.
He simply couldn’t believe that his “Little Russia” dream was gone, forever. Ukrainians won’t let their country be turned into that. Putin tried, relentlessly. In 2014, he annexed Crimea. He fueled war in Donbas, all with the same aim.
And in 2022, he decided it was time to finish the job. On paper, it was a neat plan. A blitzkrieg, Kyiv in three days. But three years haven’t been enough — and three decades wouldn’t be, either. . . .
The heroic Ukrainian people stood up to defend their homeland. And at the cost of countless lives, they held their ground. The national flag still flies over Kyiv, and it always will. . . .
I still dream that Ukraine will reclaim every inch of its territory: Donbas, Crimea, all of it. And I believe that one day, it will. History will judge, and judge fairly. But Ukraine has already won.
Dominican Republic
Protests broke out in Santo Domingo on May 13 over a new bill that critics warn could stifle freedom of speech and enable government censorship. The bill would establish an independent regulator to oversee content published on social media and digital news sites. Protesters, including journalists, marched through the capital to the National Palace, where they presented their Manifesto for Press Freedom, excerpted and translated below:
Without a free press, there is no democracy!
We, journalists, communicators, conscious citizens, and defenders of freedom of expression, raise our voices against the growing mistreatment, harassment, and delegitimization of the press in the Dominican Republic by political and governmental powers.
We denounce the intensifying of a dangerous trend in recent years: the stigmatization of critical journalism, physical aggression during public events, the use of state advertising as a form of pressure, and the manipulation of information by public institutions to control the national narrative.
We warn that these practices pose a direct threat to the foundations of our democracy. When the government becomes prosecutor, judge, and executioner of the press, it breaks the balance that guarantees citizens’ rights to be informed, to question, and to dissent.
We reject the use of power to intimidate reporters and silence media outlets. These actions not only degrade public service, but also impoverish democratic debate and foster authoritarianism.
We condemn the most recent abuses — even pregnant journalists have been shoved without restraint. The list of violent incidents against the press is long.
We demand that the Dominican government:
1) Respect and ensure the independence of journalistic work. . . .
2) End all forms of harassment, censorship, or retaliation against the media and journalists. Keep channels of dialogue open at all times.
3) Distribute state advertising based on technical and equitable criteria, not as a tool for manipulation. This is a right for all.
4) Promote real mechanisms for transparency and access to public information.
Create an environment where criticism is not criminalized, but valued as part of the democratic process.
We call on citizens, social organizations, professional associations, and the international community to stay alert. Freedom of the press is not a luxury for the media — it is a right of the people.
Now more than ever, we reaffirm our commitment to truth, ethics, and the inalienable right of all Dominicans to free, plural, and accurate information.
Without independent journalism, corruption multiplies and power runs unchecked! For a press without fear and without a muzzle! For a truly democratic Republic!
China
June 4 marks the thirty-sixth anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre. Students, workers, and other protesters gathered to demand political and economic reforms, but were brutally struck down by Chinese troops. Hundreds, if not more, were killed, and tens of thousands were arrested. The Tiananmen Mothers, a human-rights group whose children or family members were harmed in the massacre, wrote this statement honoring the anniversary. Excerpts, published and translated by Human Rights in China, appear below:
It has been 36 years since the 1989 June Fourth Massacre on Beijing’s Chang’an Avenue. For every family who lost a loved one, the scenes of that year remain seared into our hearts. The bereaved will never forget. This atrocity, engineered entirely by the government of the time, remains one of the darkest chapters in human history. The pain it has caused has never left — it is a nightmare that time cannot fade. . . .
In 1989, [families] cradled in their arms the mutilated bodies of their sons and daughters — gunned down by soldiers, mangled to pulp beneath tanks. Their screams of anguish shook the hearts of everyone present. It was terrible to witness. That summer, Beijing had become a hell on earth: drenched in the violence and the white terror wrought by the military, and shrouded in the cold, inhumane indifference of the state.
As parents frantically searched for the remains of their children, weeping in horror, the government celebrated its own violence — showering praise on the slaughter, pushing the grotesque narrative of having pacified “a counterrevolutionary riot,” and silencing dissent. A government that believes power comes from the barrel of a gun, and sustains its rule through bloodshed, is a government devoid of humanity.
We return each year to honor the dead and the loved ones they left behind, because this wound has never healed — not in the hearts of the Chinese people, and not in the hearts of the families. The pain is eternal. History will not forget the vibrant, innocent souls who were taken.
One of the victims, Tian Daomin, was 22 years old when he was killed. He was from Shishou City, Hubei Province, and was a student in the Management Department, class of 1985, at Beijing University of Science and Technology. After finishing his graduating thesis, he left campus with his classmates. . . .
After Tiananmen Square was cleared in the early hours of June 4, the students withdrew in columns of four, moving west along Chang’an Avenue. Upon reaching Liubukou, Xidan, they encountered army units. Ordinary citizens from Beijing tried to protect the students and block the troops’ advance, and knelt down in front of the tanks. The military responded by firing tear gas laced with toxic chemicals, causing many students and civilians to lose consciousness and collapse. A line of tanks then rolled over the unconscious crowd. Tian Daomin was among them. A tank crushed half of Daomin’s forehead and one of his eyes; the other half of his forehead and one eye remained intact. His body bore no other wounds. He died instantly. . . .
Victim Zhou Xinming was only sixteen years old when he was killed. He was a first-year student at the technical school of Xuehua Electrical Appliance Company. In the early morning of June 4, in front of the National Palace in Xidan, Chang’an Avenue, he was shot by soldiers while trying to rescue the wounded. The bullet was explosive. It tore through his ribs and detonated in his liver, pulverizing it. He was taken to Jishuitan Hospital in Beijing, but the doctors could do nothing. He died in the operating room. . . .
Victim Xi Guiru, 24 years old, was an employee of the Beijing Exhibition Road Labor Service Company. She was shot in the left shoulder at the north entrance of the Erqi Theater in the early morning of June 4. She died at the People’s Hospital, leaving behind a young child. . . .
Victim Wang Weiping had just graduated from Peking Medical University with a degree in clinical medicine. After the summer, she was set to begin work as a doctor in the obstetrics and gynecology department at Beijing People’s Hospital. She was shot at Muxidi while attempting to rescue the wounded. A bullet struck her neck. She fell, without even leaving behind a final word. . . .
It has been 36 years since the June Fourth Massacre. In order to secure fairness and justice for all the innocent lives that were taken, we — the families of the victims — have held our ground. . . . This massacre is not only a heavy burden on the hearts of the bereaved; it is a major historical event that weighs on the conscience of the entire Chinese people. Its gravity is not something that can be determined by any individual or political party. Yet, this national trauma has been deliberately covered up and marginalized on a national scale. It must be brought before the people so that the truth may be known. This is a matter of history — and it must be resolved through the law. . . .
We once again sincerely call for dialogue with the government. Political problems must be solved through legal means. The unresolved legacy of the June Fourth Massacre should be addressed through legislation and judicial process, in a way that is fair and just. An objective reassessment of June Fourth is the government’s duty to history, to the people, to the families of the victims — and to the international community.
Initiation of dialogue would mark the beginning of resolving this historical wound. We believe that by addressing the June Fourth Massacre, China can step into a new era — one no longer burdened by the weight of historical trauma.
Copyright © 2025 National Endowment for Democracy and Johns Hopkins University Press