The Human Rights World Has a Sexual Harassment Problem

From fear of hurting their causes to being suspected as Chinese spies, women say there’s a culture of silence about misconduct in the human rights advocacy community.

An illustration of a woman huddling in fear.

Nineteen women who work in human rights spoke to NOTUS about behavior by powerful male leaders. TRUNCUS/Shutterstock

Esma Gün couldn’t believe the messages as they crossed her screen.

The conversation had been friendly but professional: two human rights activists celebrating a policy victory. Now, Dolkun Isa, president of the World Uyghur Congress, was saying he wanted to kiss her.

Gün, a Turkish-Belgian university student, was 22 at the time and relatively new to human rights advocacy. Isa, then 53 years old, didn’t stop when she pushed back, according to screenshots of the February 2021 conversation reviewed by NOTUS and an interview with Gün. “But I would really kiss you without letting you go,” Isa wrote to her in Turkish, according to an independent interpreter hired by NOTUS.