Human Rights Watch works to end a broad array of human rights abuses, including summary executions, torture, arbitrary detention, restrictions of the freedoms of expression, association, assembly, and religion, violation of due process and discrimination on racial, gender, ethnic and religious grounds. The standards we use are universal civil and political rights, as embodied in international law and treaties. We also address such war-related abuses as indiscriminate shelling or the use of starvation as a weapon of war.