Human Rights Glossary

• Human Rights Watch (HRW)
  

  HRW – Human Rights Watch.   A prominent international human rights NGO that originated as a series of US-based “watch committees.”   The first such committee was charged to monitor Soviet compliance with the 1975 Helsinki Accords.  Subsequent committees were formed to monitor human rights concerns in Latin America, Asia, Africa and the Middle East.  Before consolidating as “Human Rights Watch” in 1988 the organization was known as the Watch Committees.