Mary Robinson
[Co-chair]

President of the NGO Realizing Rights: the Ethical Globalization Initiative, former President of Ireland and former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights

Mary Robinson was born in Ballina in Ireland. She was educated at the University of Dublin (Trinity College), King's Inns Dublin and Harvard Law School. As an academic (Trinity College Law Faculty 1968-90), legislator (Senator 1969-89) and barrister (1967-90, Senior Counsel 1980, English Bar 1973) she has always sought to use law as an instrument for social change. She also served on the International Commission of Jurists, the Advisory Committee of Interrights, and on expert European Community and Irish parliamentary committees. In 1988 Mary Robinson and her husband founded the Irish Centre for European Law at the Trinity College. Ten years later she was elected Chancellor of the University.

In 1990, Mary Robinson became the first woman President of Ireland (1990-1997), and from 1997 until 2002 she WAS the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Mary Robinson is now leading Realizing Rights: the Ethical Globalization Initiative. Its mission is to put human rights standards at the heart of global governance and policy-making and to ensure that the needs of the poorest and most vulnerable are addressed on the global stage. Mary Robinson is also Honorary President of Oxfam International and Vice President of the Club of Madrid. She is Chair of the Council of Women World Leaders, the GAVI Fund, and the Irish Chamber Orchestra.

Paulo Sérgio Pinheiro
[Co-chair]

Commissioner and Rapporteur on Children, Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, Organization of American States and Former Independent Expert of the UN Secretary-General for the study on violence against children, 2003 to 2007

Paulo Sérgio Pinheiro was born in Rio de Janeiro, in Brazil, and was educated at the Catholic University, Law School, in Rio de Janeiro and at the Institut d etudes politiques, Paris.
As an academic, he is Adjunct Professor of International Studies  at the Center for Latin American, Studies, CLAS, Watson Institute of International Studies, Brown University, and a Professor of Political Science, retired, and research associate at the Center for the Study of Violence, University of Sao Paulo, which he founded in 1987 and was director of until 2001. He has also taught at Columbia University, Notre Dame University, Oxford and the École des hautes etudes en sciences sociales, Paris. He has published many articles, essays and books on social history, democracy, violence, and human rights.

From 1995 to 1998, Paulo Sérgio Pinheiro held the position of UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights on Burundi and from 2000 to 2008 on Myanmar.

Pinheiro served as Secretary of State for Human Rights, under President Cardoso, of Brazil.

Pregs Govender

Writer, educator and feminist activist, former member of the South African National Assembly. Author of Love and Courage, A Story of Insubordination. An activist against apartheid since 1974, she served as an MP in South Africa's first democracy utill 2002 and currently chairs the Independent Review of Parliament

Pregs Govender was born in Durban, South Africa, and studied at the University of Durban-Westville, where she graduated as a teacher. Her career began at high schools and at the University of Durban-Westville. She served the trade union movement from 1987 to 1992, starting in the clothing and textile union as National Education Officer before heading SA's first Workers College.

She managed the WNC, a coalition through which 2 million rural and urban women shaped SAs transition and impacted on the Constitution. Elected ANC MP in 1994, Pregs initiated SAs gender budgeting, which catalyzed similar initiatives globally. She convened the Finance Committee's Group on Gender and Economic Policy and chaired Parliaments Committee on Women. This Committee ensured that 80% of womens legislative priorities were enacted by 1999. She edited SA's country Report to the UN Conference on Women in Beijing.

In 1999 she received the International Association for Womens Rights in Developments (AWID) Inspiration Award recognising an individual whose initiative, leadership, and unrelenting commitment have made a significant impact in advancing gender equality and social justice around the world. In 2001 her presentation of her Committee's report on HIV/AIDS, broke the silence in the ANC Caucus caused by the President's position. She was the only MP to register opposition to SAs arms-deal in the 2001 Defence Budget Vote itself and resigned in May 2002. In 2002, she was a Senior Associate at the Africa Gender Institute at the University of Cape Town and was awarded a Ford Foundation grant, to research and write on Spirituality, sexuality, politics and power. In October 2003 her Alma Mater awarded her an honorary doctorate in Philosophy, in recognition of her contribution to political transformation in South Africa. Pregs received the first Ruth First Fellowship in 2004 for courageous writing and activism. In 2004-2005 she was awarded the Fulbright New Century Scholarship (NCS): Towards the global empowerment of women. As part of her scholarship she was a senior Associate at the Centre for Womens Global Leadership at the University of Rutgers, researching Gender, Neo-liberal Globalization and Governance. She works locally and globally, with Parliaments, Governments and Civil Society, to build an alternative politics and leadership through writing, policy and education.

Saad Eddin Ibrahim

Professor of political sociology. Founder and  first  Secretary-General  of  the  Arab  Human Rights  Organization. Secretary General of  Egypt's Independent Election Review Committee. He plays a leading role in Egypt’s civil society movement

Saad Eddin Ibrahim was born in Bedeen, Mansoura, in Egypt. He studied sociology at Cairo University (B.A.) and at the University of Washington (Ph.D.).

Saad Eddin Ibrahim was a Professor of sociology at the American University in Cairo and taught in several other universities in the United States. in 1988, he founded, the Ibn Khaldun Center for Development Studies (ICDS), within the American University in Cairo. The Center concerned with issues of democratization and political and social development.

Saad Eddin Ibrahim played a leading role in Egypt's civil society movement, mainly in human rights and democracy issues. He served as secretary general of the Arab Organization for Human Rights (Cairo) and of the Egyptian Independent Commission for Electoral Review.

Hina Jilani

Human rights lawyer and co-founder of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, former Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General on Human Rights Defenders

Hina Jilani was born in Lahore, in Pakistan. Seven years after completing her law studies, she was appointed Advocate of the High Court of Pakistan in 1981, and in 1992, she was appointed Advocate of the Supreme Court.

From 2000 to April 2008 Hina Jilani acted as the Special Representative of the Secretary General on Human Rights Defenders. She has also participated in formal and informal Expert Group meetings of multiple UN Human Rights Bodies. She has represented UNICEF and UNIFEM at regional and international meetings and conferences as an expert in specific fields of Human Rights.

Hina Jilani has been involved in several national and international NGOs and is member of the board of several international Human Rights Intitutions.

In 1999 she was awarded the Human Rights Award by the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, and in 2000 she was honoured with the Amnesty International Genetta Sagan Award for Women’s Rights.

Theodor Meron

Appeals Judge, International Criminal Tribunals for former Yugoslavia and Rwanda,  Past President ICTY, Dennison Professor Emeritus and Judicial Fellow, New York Univesity Law School

Theodor Meron was born in Kalisz, Poland. He received a legal education at University of Jerusalem (M.J.), at Harvard Law School (LL.M., J.S.D.), and in Cambridge University (Diploma in Public International Law).

As an academic, he has been since 1977 a Professor of International Law and, since 1994, the holder of the Charles L. Denison Chair at New York University School of Law. From 1991 until 1995, he was Professor of International law at the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva.

From 2000 until 2001, he served as Counsellor on International Law in the U.S. Department of State.

From 2003 until 2005, he was the President of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), and was a judge in the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. He now serves as a judge on the Appeal Chamber of the ICTY. He has published numerous books and articles on human rights and international law.

Manfred Nowak

Professor of International Human Rights Protection at Vienna University, UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and Swiss Chair of Human Rights at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva

Manfred Nowak was born in Bad Aussee, in Austria. He holds an LLM from Columbia University in New York and a PhD from Vienna University.

As an academic, Manfred Nowak is Professor of Constitutional Law and Human Rights at the University of Vienna. He is also co-Director of the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute of Human Rights (BIM). From 2000 to 2007, he served also as Chairperson of the European Master Programme on Human Rights and Democratization (EMA) in Venice. From 1987 to 1989, he was Director of the Netherlands Institute of Human Rights (SIM) at the University of Utrecht, and from 2002 to 2003 Olof Palme Visiting Professor at the Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law (RWI) at the University of Lund. As from September 2008, he will also hold the Swiss Chair in Human Rights at the Graduate Institute, Geneva.

Within the United Nations, Manfred Nowak is, since 2004, the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment. Previously, he was a member of the Austrian delegation to the UN Commission on Human Rights, he was also appointed in 1993 as expert member of the UN Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearances, in 1994 as UN expert on missing persons in the former Yugoslavia, and was appointed UN expert on legal issues relating to the drafting of a binding instrument on enforced disappearances. He also advised the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights on poverty reduction strategies.

Manfred Nowak is also member of the International Commission of Jurists (elected in 1995). Between 1996 and 2003, he has served as Judge at the Human Rights Chamber for Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo. Mr. Nowak is a board member of various international and Austrian NGOs and was appointed in 2000 chairperson of a Human Rights Commission at the Austrian Ministry of Interior with the task of monitoring the police. In 1994, he was awarded a UNESCO prize for the teaching of human rights, and in 2007 the Bruno Kreisky Prize for Service to Human Rights. He has published more than 400 books and articles primarily in the field of human rights, including commentaries on the CCPR and CAT, and a textbook on the Introduction to the International Human Rights Regime.

Bertrand Ramcharan

First holder of the Swiss Chair of Human Rights at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva and Chancellor of Guyana University. He served as Deputy and then Acting UN High Commissioner for Human Rights

Bertrand Ramcharan was born in Guyana and received a legal education in England where he earned in 1973 a doctorate in international law from the London School of Economics and Political Science. He is also a Barrister of Lincoln's Inn. From 1991 until 1998, he was a Commissioner of the International Commission of Jurists and has been a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration since 1996.

As an academic, Bertrand Ramcharan was Adjunct Professor of International Human Rights Law at Columbia University, Director of Studies at the Hague Academy of International Law, Chancellor of the University of Guyana, Senior Fellow at the Ralph Bunche Institute for International Studies and Visiting Professor of International Law in Lund University, Sweden. Bertrand Ramcharan is the first holder of the HEI Swiss Chair of Human Rights at Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva.

Within the United Nations, Bertrand Ramcharan was a member of the UN Secretariat for 32 years. From 2003 until 2004, he held the position of Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights and was then Acting High Commissioner for Human Rights for one year.

Vitit Muntarbhorn

Professor Vitit Muntarbhorn gained his Bachelor and Master Degrees in Law at Oxford University. He has been working at the Faculty of Law, Chulalongkorn University, in Thailand, for more than 30 years.

He has been a Lecturer and Trainer for many human rights programmes in Thailand and other countries.

He was the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography from 1990-1994, and from 2005 he has been the Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea). In 2004, he was awarded the UNESCO Prize for Human Rights Education.