At the start of 2025 the world has been thrown into deliberate chaos, challenging the rules-based international order that began with the adoption of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights soon after the end of the Second World War, which PEN International was instrumental in creating, and the human rights framework developed subsequently. Wars and conflicts have doubled in the last five years, but cultural life – part of the social glue of communities – is rarely prioritised in reconstruction efforts.

The machinery of governments is being outsourced and privatised to the power and benefit of techbros and fossil fuel companies. Mis- and disinformation abound, often a deliberate strategy to hide the increasing and unchecked power of oligarchs to keep consolidating their wealth at the expense of the rest of the world, with no regard to the true cost of their actions, putting the entire planet at risk. The regional overviews in this Case List show the challenges we face in bringing to fruition the ideals of the PEN Charter: to oppose ‘mendacious publication, deliberate falsehood and distortion of facts for political and personal ends’. PEN International pledges to continue developing innovative ways to use literature and its influence to break down the silos of social media and to counter the hate speech and disinformation peddled by those trying to sow discord and to profit from societal collapse. PEN International’s Campaigning Handbook and recent move away from X to Bluesky are good examples of this in practice.

As this Case List shows, those who dare to challenge these developments and to speak truth to power, are at risk of being silenced: through weaponization of legal systems and lawfare by rulers and the companies that profit from their close associations with them, or through imprisonment, arbitrary detention, stigmatization (especially for those already marginalised and discriminated against). Leading to ‘othering’, all this can give the green light to physical and psychological threats and most chillingly and permanently to death. Yet it also shows that international solidarity, support, campaigning and advocacy can and does bear positive results – demonstrated by the releases and acquittals documented.

When a rules-based order starts to break down, accountability for the persecution of writers becomes an ever more distant prospect. Compiling the Case List is always challenging when deciding how to approach issues of impunity – how long to keep a writer on the Case List when there is no movement towards resolution or justice, while continuing to honour their work and memory? Going forward, PEN International could usefully consider how it might respectfully honour the memory of writers killed in war or targeted for their work, as a means of ensuring their words are not forgotten and to remind us all of the immense losses the world has suffered through these untimely deaths.

Scaling up attention on anniversaries, multilingual translations, as well as organising events and sharing commentary could be a sobering reminder of the horrors of war and killing and could act as a clarion call for peace and justice. It would also provide

opportunities for current and future generations of writers to ensure that for those whose lives were cut far too short through warfare and murder, their literature will know no frontiers and their ideas will remain common currency, despite the efforts of those who silenced them.

To these ends, PEN International makes the following recommendations to the international community:

To foster peace

• Do all within their power to bring about an immediate end to all armed conflicts, especially to end indiscriminate attacks on civilians including writers, artists, and cultural workers

• As a matter of urgency, establish a permanent ceasefire between Israel and the Hamas authorities in Gaza; between the warring parties in Sudan; restore peace in the Democratic Republic of Congo; and work towards an end to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

• Use all avenues to seek the release of hostages and work to ensure timely delivery of adequate humanitarian aid to civilian populations in conflict zones.

• Ensure the right to freedom of expression and access to information at times of conflict, and that any limitations continue to meet the three-part test focused on the principles of legality, necessity and proportionality, as accorded under Article 19(3) of the ICCPR.

• Publicly call on all parties to armed conflicts to respect the right of journalists to report on the hostilities, ensure journalists’ safety, allow all journalists seeking to evacuate from conflict zones to do so, abjure the deliberate killing of journalists, promptly and thoroughly investigate all attacks on journalists, and hold accountable individuals found to be responsible for them.

• Work to ensure that schools, cultural institutions, cultural heritage sites, and other civilian infrastructure are not targeted and that children’s right to education during times of conflict is protected, including in situations of internal and cross-border displacement.

• Support all efforts to ensure accountability, at the national and international level, for international crimes, including all acts of genocide, and violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law committed during armed conflicts.

• Work collectively towards provision of remedy, redress and reparation for past violations and the prevention of further international crimes and violations;

• Respect the independence of the ICC and the ICJ and their ongoing investigations, including by desisting from intimidation and smear campaigns against court officials.

In post-conflict situations, PEN International also calls on governments and authorities to:

• Ensure reconstruction efforts are planned and implemented with the meaningful participation of local populations, and include adequate resources for the reconstruction of the cultural sector, in line with the recommendation of the UN Special Rapporteur in the field of Cultural Rights, to pursue cultural development

• As a pillar of sustainable development on a par with its social, economic, and environmental pillars;

• Immediately end propaganda for war, incitement to genocide, and hate speech, including the advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence.

With respect to the situation in Israel and Palestine:

• Work towards an end to the Israeli occupation of Palestine and an end to systems of racial segregation and apartheid as practised by Israel, in accordance with the ICJ’s Advisory Opinion of 19 July 2024.

• Support efforts to remove unexploded ordnance and rubble and begin the reconstruction phase, with meaningful participation of Gazans, while ensuring the population has adequate access to food, drinking water, safe shelters and basic services, including medical care and education.

• Take necessary measures to protect the Palestinian people from the risk of genocide and urge Israel to immediately and unconditionally fully adhere to the provisional measures indicated by the ICJ in January, March, and May 2024 in relation to the application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in the Gaza Strip.

To protect writers

• Immediately and unconditionally release all writers, journalists, activists, artists, bloggers and other cultural workers unjustly imprisoned or detained without trial, simply for exercising their legitimate right to freedom of expression, including all detained and imprisoned writers listed in this Case List, and drop charges against any writer facing trial solely on account of their work or the peaceful expression of their opinions.

• End the practice of banishment and ‘civil death’ through forced deportation, refusal of entry and stripping of citizenship and civil rights, which can amount to a crime against humanity if applied for political reasons.

• Repeal all legislation, including criminal defamation and insult laws, and desist from introducing new laws that unduly restrict the right to freedom of expression, including online, and ensure adequate protections for a free press in all countries, in line with states’ international human rights obligations.

• Introduce procedural and punitive measures to address the growing use of SLAPPs, which have become a significant threat to media freedom and advocacy rights, as well as providing assistance, support, and protection for SLAPP targets, including legal advice free of charge. · As outlined in PEN International’s 2024 resolution on protection measures for writers at risk, ensure a comprehensive, fair and systematic response to all writers and creatives fleeing persecution:

• Investigate barriers to mobility of writers at risk with a view to removing them;

• Establish and strengthen humanitarian pathways to refuge for persecuted writers and creatives, including through visa code provisions and clear guidelines for diplomatic missions on the provision of and access to emergency assistance, with a special focus on writers facing intersecting forms of discrimination and persecution;

• Cultural sector businesses and institutions should actively consider where and how they can support persecuted writers.

To enhance the cultural role of minoritized communities

Recognise and celebrate the role of minoritized communities in advancing the culture of all states, including by:

• Taking effective measures to stem and reverse the rising tide in many countries of xenophobia, antisemitism, islamophobia and anti-LGBTQI sentiments;

• Facilitating mother tongue education, which enables members to celebrate their life, language, culture and heritage;

• Promoting translation of literatures to and from minoritized languages;

• Protecting the cultural heritage of minoritized communities;

• Ending the persecution of any writer solely on the grounds of their background and protecting the right of writers from minoritized communities to advocate for their community’s rights without fear of reprisals.

To promote and protect women writers

Implement the calls of PEN International’s Women’s Manifesto, specifically by:

• Ending all forms of violence against women and girls;

• Protecting women writers and journalists and combating impunity for attacks against them, including online;

• Eliminating gender disparity at all levels of education;

• Ensuring full equality of women in both law and practice, including by addressing structural barriers to women writers and ensuring parity for them in employment and remuneration as writers.

To protect civic space as a bulwark for the realisation of human rights

• Reaffirm the importance of civic space as a foundation for an authentic democracy that respects, protects and facilitates the human rights of citizens and civil society organisations to safely speak out, organise, associate, participate and claim their rights, including the right to express their opinion, views and criticism of the political, social, economic and cultural structures around them, and put in place adequate measures to nurture and protect it.

• Develop and implement bolder and better coordinated responses to the global rise in authoritarianism and the widespread emergency of shrinking civic space that imperil and significantly threaten to erode gains made in many countries over decades of struggle, solidarity and emerging global consensus on democratic governance and respect for human rights as foundational for peaceful, open, and just societies.

• End the use of smear campaigns that put writers at risk of physical and digital harassment and attacks, and which disproportionately affect women.

• Desist from banning books and other forms of artistic expression that do not constitute hate speech.