{"id":33329,"date":"2026-09-24T10:36:26","date_gmt":"2026-09-24T13:36:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tedic.org\/?p=33329"},"modified":"2026-09-24T10:43:51","modified_gmt":"2026-09-24T13:43:51","slug":"the-anti-ngo-law-ley-garrote-at-the-upr-when-local-advocacy-meets-international-advocacy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tedic.org\/en\/the-anti-ngo-law-ley-garrote-at-the-upr-when-local-advocacy-meets-international-advocacy\/","title":{"rendered":"The Anti-NGO Law (“Ley Garrote”) at the UPR: When Local Advocacy Meets International Advocacy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

On December 16, 2025, TEDIC, as part of the Human Rights Coordinating Body of Paraguay (Codehupy), joined a group of social organizations to formally file, before the Palace of Justice, an Unconstitutionality Action against Law No. 7363\/24, popularly known as the “Ley Garrote” (“Cudgel Law”) or “anti-NGO law.” The action challenges the fact that the law establishes excessive state control over the formation, operation, and financing of social organizations, enabling a regime of permanent suspicion and disproportionate sanctions. It further argues that the law violates the right to free association and political participation, pillars of a participatory democracy. In total, some 33 social and community organizations drove that first filing before the Supreme Court of Justice, and months later, in July 2026, five more organizations joined a second filing, reaffirming civil society’s rejection of a law that, they argue, restricts the exercise of civic freedoms in the country. Codehupy filed an Unconstitutionality Action against the Ley Garrote together with 32 civil society organizations.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

That legal action didn’t come out of nowhere, it’s the culmination of all the work Paraguayan organizations did in denouncing the law and its purposes. This 2014 article systematized<\/a> concerns about Law No. 7363\/24 for its broad and ambiguous language, which could enable excessive control over organizations and threaten their independence and freedom to operate, in a pattern that many organizations compared to what has happened in other countries in the region and around the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What we want to share in this blog is how that same complaint, Paraguayan courts on one side, the United Nations on the other, became a single advocacy strategy: an unconstitutionality action in Asunci\u00f3n, and a report to the Universal Periodic Review (UPR)<\/a> in Geneva.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The “Ley Garrote” (Anti-NGO Law) Throughout Our UPR Reports, 2025\u20132026<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The UPR is the UN Human Rights Council mechanism that reviews the human rights situation of all 193 member states every four and a half years. In 2025, the organizations that submitted the shadow report to the UPR included concerns about Law No. 7363\/24 and its regulations as risks to civic participation and the closing of civic space in Paraguay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our organization included this issue in the three reports it submitted to the UPR<\/a>, together with the Association for Progressive Communications (APC), ARTICLE 19, and Derechos Digitales. The report synthesizes concerns about the intersection of human rights and technology in Paraguay, and notes, first and foremost, a deterioration of the environment for civil society and fundamental freedoms, pointing in particular to the restriction of civic space through Law No. 7363\/24. The report describes this law as ambiguous and punitive, with excessive controls that threaten the autonomy of organizations, in a context of attacks and disinformation against entities such as our own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That written work was only the first stage: between February 9 and 13, 2026, TEDIC took part in the pre-sessions of Paraguay’s UPR in Geneva<\/a>, a key space to present the main human rights concerns and recommendations regarding the digital environment to UN member states. Our executive director, Maricarmen Sequera, presented the findings on state surveillance, lack of transparency, gaps in data protection, and the risks that the Ley Garrote poses to civic space. In addition to the official presentation, we held bilateral meetings with various diplomatic delegations to go deeper into the priority issues and promote concrete recommendations that could be incorporated into this UPR cycle, seeking to ensure that the digital rights and civic space agenda would arrive with force in the room where States would examine Paraguay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On May 6, 2026, Paraguay was reviewed at the 52nd session of the UPR Working Group, and received statements from 85 delegations, one of the highest levels of participation in that session. Among the themes that concentrated the most recommendations were the autonomy of the Ombudsman’s Office, a comprehensive anti-discrimination law, the rights of Indigenous Peoples, women, and children, and access to justice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What the State “Takes Note Of”: Accepting the Criticism Without Committing to Address It<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In UPR language, there are two possible responses to each recommendation: “accept” (the State commits to implementing it) or “note” (the State acknowledges the recommendation but does not commit to fulfilling it). The fact that Paraguay “noted” a recommendation is not a minor technicality: in practice, it means telling the international community that it will not adopt it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We put together a thorough summary of document A\/HRC\/63\/8, where States made recommendations to Paraguay in this cycle regarding the Ley Garrote and where our country only took note, meaning it did not commit to fulfilling, a particularly sensitive set of recommendations for the work we have been carrying out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the session<\/a>, some States already flagged this issue in their statements:<\/p>\n\n\n\n