The U.S. State Department, in its 2023 Human Rights Report (HRR), a country-wise compilation of human rights practices, has flagged “credible reports” of more than a dozen different kinds of human rights abuses in India, including extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrest or detention, torture to coerce confessions, repeated imposition of Internet shutdowns and blocked telecommunications, surveillance of civil society activists and journalists, intimidation and Internet trolling of human rights defenders, punishment of family members for alleged offences by a relative, and “crimes involving violence or threats of violence targeting members of ethnic and caste minorities”, among others.
The report, released by U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, highlighted that “the outbreak of ethnic conflict between the Kuki and Meitei ethnic groups” resulted in “significant human rights abuses”. It also noted that “the government took minimal credible steps or action to identify and punish officials who may have committed human rights abuses”.
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