Overview of Human Rights in Portugal

Portugal is a constitutional democracy.  Recent elections have been considered to be free and fair by international standards. The Portuguese government works to respect the civil and human rights of its citizens; however problems have been reported in recent years.  First, the judiciary is slow and thus there is lengthy pretrial detention. Of note has also been the fact that police and prison guards beat and torture suspects and detainees. Also noteworthy has been the fact that prison conditions are harsh. Finally, human trafficking is also a growing concern in the region.  That said, in global context, Portugal has a very good human rights record.

Human Development Index (HDI) Rank:

28th out of 177

Note: Human Development Index (HDI) is a composite index that measures the level of well-being of nations in the world. It uses factors such as poverty, literacy, life-expectancy, education, gross domestic product, and purchasing power parity to assess the average achievements in each nation. It has been used in the United Nation’s Human Development Report since 1993.