Although journalists can be subjected to cross-border targeting even in liberal democracies that protect media freedoms, laws that limit freedom of expression in countries with weak or nonexistent rule-of-law protections are particularly likely to be used as tools of transnational repression. In 2022, Djibouti was added to Freedom House’s database as an origin country that employes tactics of transnational repression. In May, police in Somaliland, a self-declared independent but internationally unrecognized territory in Somalia, arrested Arreh Souleiman Aouled, a Djiboutian activist who had posted critical remarks about Djiboutian president Ismail Omar Guelleh on Facebook.16 Although Aouled was reportedly initially taken into custody without being presented with a warrant, authorities eventually charged him under a criminal law prohibiting speech that insults the dignity of another person. Human rights groups feared that Aouled would be spirited out of the country after reports emerged that the Djibouti government sent a helicopter to transport the activist.17 Aouled was eventually acquitted. However, activism in Somalia against the repressive government of a neighboring state remains dangerous. Journalists have been the targets of 97 incidents, or 11 percent of all incidents, of physical transnational repression identified by Freedom House since 2014. In December, Bolivia expelled a Cuban activist who had lived in the country for three years. Magdiel Jorge Castro, who has an active social media following and routinely criticizes the Cuban government, was accused by Bolivian migration authorities of violating a 2013 law that prohibits foreign nationals from “disturbing national security or the public order.” He was given 15 days to leave the country.18 There was no verified evidence that Castro’s expulsion from Bolivia was done at the request of Cuban authorities. However, the incident mirrors familiar trends in the cross-border targeting of exiles in which host governments repress or harass activist members of a diaspora at times when the bilateral relationship between the host and origin country is improving. This was the case in 2021 when Turkey began to detain Uyghur activists during a period of warmer relations with Beijing. Similarly, Castro’s expulsion coincided with a meeting of the Bolivian and Cuban heads of state in Havana as part of the Summit of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our Americas-People’s Trade Treaty (ALBA-TCP). Existing laws in host countries that infringe on the freedom of expression of foreign nationals, refugees, or asylum seekers can be used to suppress dissent and, in some cases, effectively accomplish the same aims as direct methods of transnational repression. Weak protections for refugees also imperil journalists and others targeted with transnational repression. In August, authorities in Malaysia deported Syed Fawad Ali Shah, a journalist from Pakistan who had lived in the country as a legally recognized refugee since 2014. Shah had reported on the activities of Pakistani security services in connection to enforced disappearances and had allegedly been abducted and tortured as a consequence of his work.19 Malaysian authorities confirmed that Shah was deported after a request was made by the Pakistan High Commission in Kuala Lumpur, which claimed that Shah was a former police officer wanted for disciplinary proceedings.20 Freedom of expression continues to be under attack around the world. Freedom House’s Freedom in the World 2023 report found that in 2022, independent media came under attack—including via criminal prosecution, extrajudicial violence, and censorship—in 157 countries and territories. Exiled journalists and activists are doubly vulnerable, exposed to repressive laws in host countries and to targeting by foreign autocrats. NEW POLICY RESPONSES, CONTINUING GAPS IN PROTECTION AND ACCOUNTABILITY The governments of countries where exiles and diasporas have found refuge are beginning to consider policies to counter transnational repression. Most of these responses, however, prioritize mechanisms for ensuring domestic security while both overlooking vulnerabilities within the migration system and weakening international accountability by making foreign policy tradeoffs. In November 2022, responding to a report by Safeguard Defenders documenting the presence of three unofficial police stations run by the government of China in the United Kingdom,21 the British government announced the creation of the Defending @freedomhouse 5