Human rights in the Maldives

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Human rights in the Maldives, an archipelagic nation of 417,000 people off the coast of the Indian Subcontinent,^[1] is a contentious issue. In its 2011 Freedom in the World report, Freedom House declared the Maldives "Partly Free", claiming a reform process which had made headway in 2009 and 2010 had stalled.^[2] The United States Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor claims in their 2012 report on human rights practices in the country that the most significant problems are corruption, lack of religious freedom, and abuse and unequal treatment of women.^[3]

The Maldives has a longstanding practice of employing criminal defamation laws as a means to suppress dissent. However, following the implementation of the Anti-Defamation and Freedom of Expression Act in August 2016, the threats posed to the media and opposition critics escalated further. The act imposes significant fines for content or speech that is deemed to contradict Islamic tenets, jeopardize national security, challenge social norms, or infringe upon the rights, reputation, or good name of others during Yameen Rasheed's tenure.^[4] The act was repealed by the Parliament on 14 November 2018.^[5]

President Yameen's government has employed an alarming tactic of leveraging broad and ambiguously worded laws to target, apprehend, and incarcerate dissenting voices. This strategy involves the misuse of counterterrorism laws against opposition activists and politicians, as well as the application of anti-defamation laws to suppress the media and social media activists who voice criticism against the president or his policies. Moreover, the government has imposed stringent limitations on assemblies, resulting in the prohibition or severe restriction of peaceful rallies and protests. These actions have raised concerns about the state of freedom of expression and civil liberties in the country.^[4]