Advisory Council - Detailed Biographies

Pakistan's lawyers drew enormous strength and comfort from the support they received from the outside world over the course of their struggle for the rule of law and the restoration of an independent judiciary. Today, we have a similar, but even greater, obligation to the people of Sri Lanka to demand that the human rights of ALL citizens are protected, and that international human rights laws and norms are strictly adhered to in the treatment of all people detained since the end of the country's civil war.

Aitzaz Ahsan

is one of the leading constitutional, commercial, corporate and human rights attorneys in Pakistan.

He is widely acknowledged as one of the most effective and outspoken advocates of an open and plural society and his politics have been non-violent throughout his career.

During the military regimes, Mr Ahsan defended scores of political prisoners in military court trials under Martial Law. And as the Leader of the Lawyers’ Movement he led and sustained a hugely popular, non-violent, and democratic movement for moderate values and rule of law culminating in the restoration of democracy and the reinstatement of the independent judiciary.

Recently he has had the distinction of being the only attorney to represent both the former Prime Ministers of Pakistan: Ms. Benazir Bhutto and Mr. Nawaz Sharif, and thus of straddling the intense political divide in Pakistan.

He successfully defended the Chief Justice of Pakistan, Mr Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry in the Presidential Reference filed against the Chief Justice. Later he was counsel for Presidential Candidate Justice (rtd) Wajihuddin Ahmed against General Musharraf. Mr Ahsan is presently counsel, in the Supreme Court, for a victim of the gang-rape allegedly sanctioned by a village council.

In 1997, Mr Ahsan, along with President Kim Dae Jung (Korea) and Dr. Kamal Hussain (former Foreign Minister, Bangladesh) went to the United Nations to promote the cause of democracy in Burma on behalf of Nobel Laureate Aung Sung Suu Kyi and the Forum for the Democratic Leaders of Asia-Pacific.

There is a quote by Martin Luther King that comes in my mind with respect to all horrifying happenings in Sri Lanka: "We shall have to repent in this generation, not so much for the evil deeds of the wicked, but of the appalling silence of the good people"

Beate Arnestad

is a Norwegian film maker. She has over twenty years of experience producing and directing content for both the entertainment and documentary departments at the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation. She has worked in Egypt, Turkey, India, China, Singapore, Thailand, USA and various countries in Europe.

Her most recent documentary My Daughter the Terrorist was independently produced and filmed during the time Arnestad lived in Sri Lanka. The film is ground breaking, as no one has ever followed the Black Tigers as they prepare for a mission. My Daughter the Terrorist is currently being screened at film festivals all over the world, and has received several mentions and awards including the Centaur Award for best full-length documentary, at Message to Man in St. Petersburg. She is currently working on a film dealing with a court case at the ICTR; the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

"I believe that military victory achieves only a temporary absence of war but no real peace. What is most urgent now is that the Tamil grievances that led to this war be addressed and that a truth and reconciliation commission begins to be formed. Otherwise, I worry that the divisions on this island will become etched even deeper."

Adele Barker

Adele Barker is Professor of Russian and Slavic Studies at the University of Arizona in Tucson, Arizona. She received her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from New York University , studied at Moscow State University and has taught at the University of Washington in addition to the University of Arizona. She has worked with NGO’s in Russia, run government sponsored exchanges between the University of Arizona and academic institutions in Turkmenia and Kazakhstan. She is the author or editor of five books on Russia and the Soviet Union. In 2001-2002 she spent the year as a Fulbright Senior Scholar at the University of Peradeniya in Sri Lanka. She returned to the island for two extended stays after the tsunami and has spent time in the Tamil north. Her recently published work of creative non-fiction Not Quite Paradise: An American Sojourn in Sri Lanka (Beacon Press, 2010) is part-memoir, part-travelogue of her own life on an island at war with itself. She is deeply concerned about both the physical and psychological problems faced by those who have been displaced by the tsunami and the civil war.

An audio version of Adele's book not quite paradise can be downloaded from Audible:

Not Quite Paradise (US)

Not Quite Paradise (UK)

I respect and admire much of what Sri Lanka has done and represent in the Third World and the Non Aligned Movement. Their Government won the war against the LTTE and that is good. They now urgently need to win the peace on behalf and for the benefit of all the people of Sri Lanka. To that end, international support and cooperation should be sought, not resisted.

Lakhdar Brahimi

is former Foreign Minister of Algeria, Ambassador and international diplomat. Negotiated the end of civil war in Lebanon on behalf of the League of Arab States; led several UN Peace Operations, notably in South Africa, Haiti, Afghanistan , Iraq . Chaired the Independent Commission set up in 2000 by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan which produced a report on UN Peace Operations endorsed by the Millennium Summit and widely known as "The Brahimi Report". 

Member of "The Elders" & the Global Leadership Forum; Governing Board, SIPRI; Board of Trustees, International Crisis Group and Global Humanitarian Forum.

"Sri Lanka is heading towards an avoidable catastrophe. If we can persuade the Government of Sri Lanka in time that peace will only last if it is built upon a foundation of justice and respect for human rights then there is no reason why Sri Lanka cannot put ethnic violence and division firmly in its past. But the path that the Government of Sri Lanka is walking leads to totalitarianism, and will inevitably lead back to war."

Fred Carver

is the Campaign Director of the Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace and Justice.

Before that he had a career in electoral campaigning and local government. He came to the Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace and Justice after a period spent studying the politics of South Asia and writing articles, both on statebuilding and human rights in a South Asian context and issues of accountability and democracy more widely. Before starting in his current role he spent time in Sri Lanka talking to victims of torture and arbitrary detention and their families.

I wish to underline, that what I see in Sri Lanka is a total crisis of democracy, rule of law and human rights affecting ALL not just minorities only

Basil Fernando

is the Executive Director of the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) and the Asian Legal Resource Centre (ALRC)

He has been active in human rights and social action issues continuously from his youth years. He graduated from the Faculty of Law of the University of Ceylon, Colombo, Sri Lanka in 1972 and practiced law from 1980 to 1989 at the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka with an emphasis in Criminal Law, Employment Law and Human Rights Law.

He was an Appeals Counsel for Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong, for a project sponsored by the United Nation High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) from 1989 to 1992. From 1992 to 1993, he was a Senior United Nations Human Rights Officer-in-Charge of the Investigation Unit in Cambodia under the UN Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC). He was the Officer-in-Charge and the Chief of the Legal Assistance at the Cambodia Office of United Nations Center for Human Rights from 1993 to 1994. He has been the Executive Director of the AHRC and ALRC from 1994 up to the present.

He is the author and editor of several books on Human Rights related issues and legal reform issues, and has contributed many articles to academic journals and the media. He is the Chief Editor Human Rights SOLIDARITY and Editor of Article 2.

Mr. Fernando has conducted nearly 100 workshops and consultations on Reconciliation issues as well as on diverse aspects of Human Rights and Legal Reform and he was awarded the Kuwanju (Korea) Human Rights prize for 2001.

No one should stand by while human beings are herded into camps, those who expose their plight are murdered, those who try to help them are expelled and those who claim to believe in justice remain silent.

Charles Glass

is an Author, journalist, and broadcaster specialising in the Middle East. Charles writes regularly for The Spectator, was ABC News chief Middle East correspondent from 1983-93, and has worked as a correspondent for Newsweek and The Observer. His work has appeared in newspapers and magazines, and on television networks, all over the world.

Glass himself made headlines in 1987, when he was taken hostage for 62 days in Lebanon by Hezbollah, the Shi'ite Muslim group, and is the only Western hostage in Lebanon known to have escaped, which he describes in his book, Tribes with Flags. In 1988, he exposed Saddam Hussein's then-secret biological weapons program. The U.S. government rejected Glass's claims, until Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990. One year later, he went alone with a hidden camera to Indonesian-occupied East Timor and, despite government restrictions, filmed and filed a report on repression and torture. This report influenced a U.S. Senate committee to vote to suspend U.S. military aid to Indonesia. He has covered wars in the Middle East, Eritrea, Rhodesia, Somalia, Iraq and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

He has lectured regularly on the Middle East, American foreign policy, world journalism and human rights in the United States and Britain.

If you see the justice of the Tamil quest for equality in Sri Lanka and do nothing about it you stand  condemned

Bruce Haigh

is a former Australian diplomat.He served in South Africa from 1976/79 where he initiated Australian Embassy contact with members of the black South African resistance, including the Black Consciousness Movement. Included amongst the friends he made at this time were Steve Biko and Dr. Mamphela Ramphele. Bruce helped a number of political activists escape South Africa including banned newspaper editor, Donald Woods, and his role in this escape was portrayed in the film, "Cry Freedom" produced by Richard Attenborough.

Bruce has also worked in the Australian Embassy in Saudi Arabia (1982/84), was Director of the Indonesia Section (1984/86), worked in Islamabad (1986/88) when he travelled to Afghanistan to report on the war and other aspects of the Soviet occupation. In 1994, he was Deputy High Commissioner at the Australian High Commission, Colombo.

Bruce was instrumental in helping to set up the Ifa Lethu Foundation which locates, repatriates and curates South African works of art taken out of the country during the years of apartheid. He now provides regular political analysis on international and domestic issues for radio and television, conferences and writes for a number of newspapers.

I have been shocked to see friends from Sri Lanka become increasingly intimidated and silenced over the last few years. The whole world should be concerned that the seeds of the next conflict are being sown right now.’

Carolyn Hayman OBE

is a specialist in conflict resolution and peace-making and has direct experience of building coalitions for peace in Sudan.  After a brief career in the UK civil service, Carolyn has focused on supporting innovation and startups in the private and not for profit sector. She was a Board member of the Commonwealth Development Corporation from 1994 to 1999, is currently a member of the Quaker UN Office (Geneva) Committee, and received an OBE in 2003.

The world cannot continue to ignore the suffering of the approximately 280,000 Tamil civilians, including women and - according to Amnesty International - at least 50,000 children, illegally detained in internment camps in northern Sri Lanka. The imminent monsoon will create life threatening conditions in these camps, and risks causing a humanitarian catastrophe.

Bianca Jagger

has worked as a human rights advocate for over thirty years, campaigning in defence of human rights, civil liberties, peace, social justice and environmental protection.

She is President and Founder of the Bianca Jagger Human Rights Foundation, a Council of Europe Goodwill Ambassador, Chair of the World Future Council and Trustee of the Amazon Charitable Trust.

Jagger has been the recipient of many prestigious international awards, not least of which is the Right Livelihood Award, also known as the “alternative Nobel prize”. Others include the United Nations Earth Day International Award, the Amnesty International USA Media Spotlight Award for Leadership for her Human Rights work around the world, the World Citizenship Award from The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, the World Achievement Award from Mikhail Gorbachev. In November 2000, Ms. Jagger received The National Association of Criminal Defence Lawyer (NACDL) Champion of Justice Award, naming her as a “steadfast and eloquent advocate for the elimination of the death penalty in America .” She holds two doctorates honoris causa: an honorary doctorate in Human Rights from Simmons College , and an honorary doctorate in Humanities from Stonehill College , Boston Massachusetts .

Bianca Jagger is a member of the Executive Director’s Leadership Council for Amnesty International USA, the Advisory Committee of Human Rights Watch America , and was a member of the Advisory Board of the Coalition for International Justice, and the Twentieth Century Task Force to Apprehend War Criminals.

"The Eelam war in Sri Lanka resulted from an inability of the state to develop politcal equity for all its citizens, in particular its ethnic Tamils, who have for decades suffered formal and informal discrimination. The horrors of that war were perpetrated by boths sides and now it is ended. It is now the task of any government claiming to rule on behalf of all citizens to again seek political equity, rather than the imposition of the sometimes discriminatory views of the majority at the expense of the legiitmate rights of the minority."

Damien Kingsbury

Professor Damien Kingsbury holds a Personal Chair in the School of International and Political Studies at Deakin University. He is the author and editor of numerous books and a large number of articles on political and security matters in the South-East and South Asian region and has advised the Australian government on a range of security policy issues.

In 2005, Professor Kingsbury was advisor to the Free Aceh Movement in the historic Helsinki peace talks, in which he drafted the negotiating points and negotiated much of the final agreement, including the critical last point on local democracy. The Helsinki peace talks brought and end to almost three decades of separatist war through the introduction of regional autonomy, democratic elections and controls over the armed forces and police. In 2008, the mediator of the talks, Martti Ahtisaari, received the Nobel Peace Prize.

Professor Kingsbury is a regular contributor to and commentator for Australian and international mediator, including the BBC, Financial Times, Washington Post, Associated Press, Reuters, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, The Sydney Morning Herald, The National Times, The Age and many others.

The Tamil struggle for justice and self-determination is a cause that should be supported by all citizens of good faith. Like the disenfranchised Palestinians, Tamil stories should resonate around the world.

Antony Loewenstein

is an independent freelance journalist, author and blogger.He has written for many Australian and international newspapers, including the Guardian, Washington Post, Haaretz and the Nation, and appears regularly around the world on radio, TV (including Democracy Now!), in public, writer’s festivals (in Australia and overseas) and at universities (including Harvard) discussing current affairs, politics and media.

Antony contributed a major chapter to 2004’s Australian best-seller, Not Happy, John! on the Middle East. His best-selling book on the Israel/Palestine conflict, My Israel Question, was short-listed for the 2007 New South Wales Premier’s Literary Award. He was a contributor to A Time to Speak Out: On Israel, Zionism and Jewish Identity and his second book, The Blogging Revolution is on the internet in repressive regimes.

He writes regularly for online magazines New Matilda and Crikey, is a board member of Macquarie University’s Centre for Middle East and North African Studies and co-founder of advocacy group Independent Australian Jewish Voices. He contributed to Amnesty International Australia’s 2008 campaign about Chinese internet repression and the Beijing Olympic Games.

International pressure on Sri Lanka is working. Now is the time to intensify it, to bring about real negotiations over how to recognize and implement the Tamils’ legitimate right to self-determination. That is not going to go away because it is based on human needs – as long as it remains unfulfilled, the peoples of Sri Lanka will be condemned to endure a repeating cycle of violence and abuse.

Jake Lynch

is Director of the Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Sydney

He is also co-convener of its Sri Lanka Human Rights Project, an Executive Member of the Sydney Peace Foundation and an Advisor to the Toda Institute for Global Peace and Policy Research.

Following his PhD (City University, London), Jake has spent the past 12 years researching, developing, teaching and training in peace journalism – and practising it, as an experienced international reporter in television and newspapers. He was an on-air presenter, anchoring over a thousand bulletins for BBC World News; the Sydney Correspondent for the London Independent newspaper, and a Political Correspondent for Sky News.

Jake has led training workshops in peace journalism for media professionals in many countries including Indonesia, the Philippines, Nepal, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, Cyprus, Armenia, Georgia, Norway and the UK. Publications include several books, including the landmark Peace Journalism, and in 2008, Jake was guest editor of a special edition of the Routledge scholarly journal, Global Change, Peace and Security.

In 2009, he won a prestigious competitive grant, worth half a million dollars, from the Australian Research Council, to investigate prospects for devising a Global Standard for reporting conflict, in partnership with the International Federation of Journalists and the aid agency, Act for Peace.
 

Chibli Mallat

is Presidential Professor of Law and Professor of Middle Eastern Law and Politics at the University of Utah. He also holds the EU Jean Monnet Chair of Law at St Joseph 's University in Lebanon. He has been tenured on three continents, and has in his academic career held teaching and research positions at a number of universities, including Princeton, Yale, Lyon, London, and Virginia. He has published over thirty books in English, French and Arabic, including the award-winning The Renewal of Islamic Law, Cambridge 1993, Introduction to Middle Eastern Law, Oxford 2007, and Iraq: Guide to Law and Policy, in press at Aspen.

As a legal practitioner and consultant, he was lead counsel in a number of international criminal law cases, including for the Sabra and Chatila victims in Belgium, for Imam Musa Sadr’s family against Mu‘ammar al-Qaddafi, and has helped set up Amnesty International's regional office in Beirut in 2000, for which he acts as legal counsel. In 1996, he helped establish Indict, the international NGO that worked to bring Saddam Hussein and his aides to justice. He has advised several governments and governmental agencies on various legal issues, currently as Senior Legal Advisor to the Global Justice Project: Iraq. He is a frequent contributor to the media, and presently edits the Beirut Daily Star law page. In 2005, he ran the first democratic campaign for the Lebanese presidency.

Now is the time to settle the civil conflict in Sri Lanka, which has consumed thousands of life and brought severe misery to countless others. In the short term, access should be provided to the UN and international relief agencies to deal with the humanitarian problems facing refugees and lists of detainees should be made available. In the long run, economic development in the war torn areas must proceed hand in hand with political measures aimed at reconciliation and empowerment.

Rajan Menon

is an American foreign policy specialist

He is the Monroe J. Rathbone Professor of International Relations at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania and, in August 2010, will become the Spitzer Professor in Political Science at the City College of New York/City University of New York.

His current work concerns American foreign policy; globalization; terrorism; security issues in Northeast Asia; the political and security dimensions of energy development in the Caspian Sea zone; and the comparative study of empires; and the international relations of Russia and the other post-Soviet states.

He was Senior Advisor at the Carnegie Corporation of New York for two years, where he played a key role in developing the Corporation’s “Russia Initiative.” He has also served as Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and as Director for Eurasia Policy Studies at the Seattle-based National Bureau for Asian Research (NBR). He has also served as Special Assistant for Arms Control and National Security to Congressman Stephen J. Solarz (D-NY)

He has authored or edited five books and more than 60 articles in leading academic journals and edited volumes. He writes often for the Los Angeles Times and has also written opinion pieces for Newsweek, the International Herald Tribune, Financial Times, washingtonpost.com, Christian Science Monitor, and the Chicago Tribune. He has been a commentator on the BBC, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, CNN, and National Public Radio.
 

I don’t want yet again to be wringing my hands, in a few months or years, about something close to ethnic cleansing or genocidal war crimes that we failed to investigate or prevent while there was still time.

Edward Mortimer CMG

Was Senior Vice-President and Chief Programme Officer at the Salzburg Global Seminar and chair of the Advisory Council. From 1998 to 2006 he served as chief speechwriter and (from 2001) as director of communications to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan. He has spent much of his career as a journalist, first with The Times of London, where he developed an expertise in Middle East affairs, and later with the Financial Times, where from 1987 to 1998 he was the main commentator and columnist on foreign affairs. 

Mr. Mortimer has also served as a fellow and/or faculty at several institutions, including Oxford University (where he was a Fellow of All Souls College), the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the International Institute of Strategic Studies, and (as Honorary Professor) the University of Warwick; and on the governing bodies of several non-governmental organizations, including Chatham House, the Institute of War and Peace Reporting, the John Stuart Mill Institute, the 21st Century Trust, Minority Rights Group International, the Agence France-Presse Foundation and the Children’s Radio Foundation.

"Sri Lanka is rated the 4th most dangerous place in the world for journalists, higher even than Afghanistan. The new peace in Sri Lanka has come at a high cost to freedom of expression and the human rights of its citizens."

Lucy Popescu

Lucy Popescu is a writer, journalist and editor with a background in human rights, literature and theatre. For over 20 years she worked with the English Centre of PEN, the international association of writers, and was Director of its Writers in Prison Committee from 1991 to 2006. Lucy co-edited the PEN anthology, Another Sky (Profile Books, 2007). The Good Tourist, her book about human rights and ethical travel, was published by Arcadia Books in 2008. She writes a monthly column in the Literary Review about persecuted writers and journalists, reviews books, theatre and film and contributes to various publications in the UK and abroad, including The Guardian, The Independent, Independent on Sunday, Words without Borders and Tribune magazine. Lucy is a trustee of the JMK Award for theatre directors and a creative writing mentor for the Write to Life Programme at Freedom from Torture (formerly the Medical Foundation). She is an elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Teesta Setalvad

is a renowned journalist and human rights activist based in Mumbai. In addition to her role as Secretary of Citizens for Justice and Peace, she is Director of KHOJ  - Education for a Plural India Programme, and Editor of Communalism Combat, as well as Advisory Consultant to the International Centre for Transitional Justice, New York and South Africa.

In her career as journalist since 1983, Teesta has written for a number of papers, including the Business India. Her film credits include ‘Bombay – a Myth Shattered’ on the 1993 Bombay riots. She has received many awards for journalism, including the Prince Claus Award 2000 (Netherlands) for Communalism Combat, and  the Chameli Devi Jain Award for Outstanding Woman Journalist  1993 for her coverage of the riots.

Teesta has a strong interest in the role of curricula in reinforcing or combating inter-communal stereotyping, and served, among many other roles, as a member of the Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) for the Government of India. Her advocacy has extended also to the protection of rights on minorities, Dalits and women, and judicial and police reform.

The deaths and suffering in the war’s last few months as described by the UN Secretary-General’s Panel of Experts was a tragedy. These sorts of events can only happen in a society that has carried a burden of differences and difficulties for some time.

Without true accountability and reconciliation, the challenge of which is not to be underestimated, there will be sadly further conflict and suffering in Sri Lanka. Only in a free and fair democracy with the rule of law, can the human rights of all Sri Lankans – and especially the Tamil, Muslim and other minorities – be truly respected.

Scott Sheeran

is a Senior Lecturer, and Co-Director of the LLM in International Human Rights law, at the School of Law and Human Rights Centre, University of Essex.. He teaches, researches and practices in the fields of international human rights and humanitarian law and United Nations law. He has guest lectured at various institutions, including the University of Cambridge, and published on various issues in leading academic journals. He is co-editor with Professor Sir Nigel Rodley of the forthcoming Routledge Handbook on International Human Rights Law.

Scott’s prior work experience includes a number of years in the New Zealand Foreign Service, including a three-year posting as the Legal Adviser at the New Zealand Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York. During this time, Scott was appointed Vice-Chair of the UN Sixth (Legal) Committee of the General Assembly, and was a member of the Bureau of the International Criminal Court (ICC) Assembly of State Parties. He has also worked on issues concerning human rights in Sri Lanka, including at the UN Human Rights Council.

Scott has been previously a legal counsel in a constitutional law firm in New Zealand, a consultant for The Boston Consulting Group, and a UNITAR Fellow at Columbia Law School. Scott has a Master of Laws (International law) from the University of Cambridge, and is admitted as a Barrister and Solicitor of the High Court of New Zealand.

Reconciliation in Sri Lanka can only be built on Truth, Justice and accountability. 

Reports of continued intimidation of media and human rights defenders amid extrajudicial killings, continued disappearances, abductions and deteriorating rule of law make the Sri Lanka Campaign's objectives more urgent.

I believe that unless allegations of war crimes are addressed through a truth seeking mechanism and/or an independent commission or criminal investigation which places victims at the centre of the process, reconciliation will continue to elude Sri Lanka.

Yasmin Sooka

is the Executive Director of the Foundation for Human Rights in South Africa. She is one of three co-authors of the April 2011 Panel of Experts' report on Sri Lanka done at the request of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon.

Prior to joining the Foundation, she was a member of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa, serving first for three years as Deputy Chair to the Human Rights Violations Committee and then as the chair of the committee. She authored the final report of the TRC. During 2002 and 2004 she was appointed by the UN as an international commissioner for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Sierra Leone.

She has consulted and assisted the governments of Ghana, Nepal, Afghanistan, Burundi, and Liberia in setting up truth commissions. Yasmin also serves on The Board of Trustees for Black Sash Trust, International Coalition of Historic Site Museums of Conscience, is Executive member for Niwano Peace Foundation as well as Advisory member for Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies and Institute for International Law.