Human Rights Watch is an international NGO based in New York City working with human rights issues.
The organization was started under the name Helsinki Watch in 1978 to monitor the Soviet Union's compliance to the Helsinki Accords. Other watch organizations was started to cover other parts of the world. They were united in 1988 and formed Human Rights Watch.
Human Rights Watch was one of six international NGOs who founded the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers in 1998.