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CHAIRMAN OF THE ICHR, PROFESSOR WILLIAM SCHABAS, RECEIVES RIA GOLD MEDAL
From left, Professor Eugene Kennedy, Professor Attracta Ingram, Professor Luke Drury, Professor Sean O’ Scanlan Engineering Sciences Gold Medallist, Professor William Schabas, Social Sciences Gold Medal, and the Minister for Education and Skills, Ruairi Quinn, T.D.
Minister Ruairi Quinn, T.D., recently presented the Royal Irish Academy (RIA) Gold Medals to the international human rights scholar Professor William Schabas and engineer Professor John O’Scanlan in recognition of their outstanding contributions to the Social Sciences and the Engineering Sciences.
The RIA Medals acclaim Ireland’s foremost contributors to the world of learning and science. The Gold Medals are awarded to two outstanding academics each year and are recognised as a truly national expression of celebration for scholarly achievement. The medals are sponsored by The Higher Education Authority and The Irish Independent.
Professor William Schabas, Chairman of the Irish Centre for Human Rights at NUI Galway, is one of the leading scholars in the field of international criminal law. His work is closely linked with a range of international judicial institutions including, the international criminal tribunals for the former Yugoslavia, Rwanda and Sierra Leone and the International Criminal Court (ICC). His writings are regularly cited by international courts and tribunals, including the ICC and the European Court of Human Rights. Professor Schabas’ seminal book on the Genocide Convention was cited in the opinions of the ICC in the 2007 Bosnia v. Serbia judgement and clearly influenced the thinking of the court as a whole.
Professor John O’Scanlan, UCD, is widely recognised as one of the leading international living circuit theorists. Professor Scanlan has many awards and distinctions, a former President of the Royal Irish Academy (1993-1996); he is also a life fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and is a recipient of the Golden Jubilee Medal of the IEEE Circuits and Systems Society.
Welcoming this award NUI Galway President Dr Jim Browne said: “On behalf of NUI Galway, I extend warmest congratulations to our colleague, Professor Schabas on receiving this wonderful distinction from the RIA. This accolade will undoubtedly add lustre to his international academic standing, as well as underscore this University’s reputation as a centre of world-class research and teaching.”TOTAL NUMBER OF ICHR DOCTORAL GRADUATES FOR 2011 REACHES 13
In the last month another three successful vivas have taken place at the Irish Centre for Human Rights. This brings the total number of PhD graduates to a veritable rush of 13 for the last year, indicating that the Centre, after ten years of establishment, is firmly at the forefront of institutions of its type worldwide. Its past doctoral graduates have regularly gone on to high-level employment in universities, institutions, research centres and international courts and tribunals all over the globe. All at the Centre wish its latest graduates the very best in their bright futures.
Wibke Timmermann (centre-left) successfully defended her
doctoral thesis in Galway on December 5th 2011. The thesis is entitled: 'Hate Speech and
Incitmement in International Criminal Law'. Dr Ludovic Hennebel(left), of the Centre
Perelman de Philosophie du Droit at the Université Libre de Bruxelles was the
internal examiner, Dr Kathleen Cavanaugh (right) was the internal examiner, and Professor William Schabas (centre-right) supervised.
Eadaoin O'Brien (centre-right) successfully completed her viva at the Centre on December 12th 2011. Her thesis is on 'The Exhumation of Mass Graves by International Criminal Tribunals: Nuremberg, the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda'.The internal examiner was Dr Kathleen Cavanaugh (centre-left), the external Professor Sue Black (right) from the University of Dundee, and Eadaoin was supervised by Professor Ray Murphy (left).
And on the 15th December 2011 Andrea Breslin (centre-left) succesfully defended her thesis on the 'The Obligation of the EU and its
Member States to Ensure Respect for International Humanitarian Law'. Andrea was supervised
by Dr Shane Darcy (centre-right). Her external examiner was Professor Iain Scobbie (right) of the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, and her internal was Professor Ray Murphy (left).
24 March 2012
National University of Ireland Galway
A one-day conference organized by the
Irish Centre for Human Rights and the School of Law, NUI Galway
This
conference seeks to explore and analyse issues of law and policy for
Ireland arising from the 2011 adoption by the United Nations of
Professor John Ruggie’s framework for business and human rights. The
framework emphasises a State’s duty to protect human rights, a corporate
responsibility to respect human rights and the need to provide remedies
to respond to violations of human rights by business.
This conference
seeks to look beyond the voluntary corporate
social responsibility approach to business and human rights; as Maurice
Manning, President of the Irish Human Rights Commission has observed,
“voluntarism can never be a substitute for global standards on
businesses' mandatory compliance with human rights”.
Contributions will seek to address legal
questions which arise in relation to the UN framework on business and
human rights. Ireland represents an
obvious case study in this context, given the presence of numerous
multinational corporations, increasing privatisation of public services
and allegations of corporate involvement in human rights violations both
in and outside of Ireland.
The conference aims to address the following topics:
- · Legal and policy approaches to regulation of Irish companies for human rights
- · Obligations of the State and companies when public functions are privatised
- · Role of extraterritorial jurisdiction in Irish law to address violations committed overseas by Irish companies or multinationals based here
- · The potential role of criminal law to address violations of human rights by business
- · Civil litigation as a means accountability – lessons from the Alien Tort Claims Act
- · Remedies for victims
The conference is organised by Dr Shane Darcy (
shane.darcy
nuigalway.ie) and Dr Ciara Hackett (
ciara.hackettnuigalway.ie).
For further information and registration for the conference please
contact: Hadeel Abu Hussein:
h.abuhussein1nuigalway.ie
Registration for the conference " Ireland and the United Nations Framework for Business and Human Rights" is now open. Please visit the website for full conference details and online registration: http://www.conference.ie .
THE KURDISH CONFLICT IN TURKEY
On Tuesday, 1 November, 2pm,
Dr Edel Hughes, from the University of Limerick delivered a lecture on
'Identity and Dissent: Understanding the Kurdish Conflict in Turkey’,
in Room 333, Aras Moyola, NUI Galway.
This event was hosted by the Research Cluster on Conflict, Rights and Security.
Edel Hughes is a lecturer at the School of Law, University of Limerick. She graduated from University College Cork in 2002 with a BCL (Law and French) and was awarded an LLM in International Human Rights Law from the National University of Ireland,Galway in 2003. Prior to joining the UL School of Law, she worked as a research assistant at the Irish Centre for Human Rights, NUI Galway, where she completed her PhD in 2009. Edel has worked as a lecturer with Amnesty International (Irish Section) and in recent years has engaged in research and advocacy work for various non-governmental human rights organisations. A monograph based on her PhD thesis entitled Turkey’s Accession to the European Union: The Politics of Exclusion? was published by Routledge in 2010.
Ireland and the Universal Periodic Review
On 6 October 2011, Ireland was examined for the first time under the universal periodic review mechanism of the United Nations Human Rights Council. The Irish Centre for Human Rights hosted a breakfast viewing of the event which was streamed live from Geneva. The viewing was followed by a discussion of the merits and failures of the universal periodic review process. The universal periodic review, a new mechanism introduced following the establishment of the Human Rights Council in March 2006, constitutes an examination of the human rights record of each member state of the United Nations with the objective of, amongst other things, improving 'the human rights situation on the ground'. Ireland has been preparing for some time for its turn for review before its peers at the Council. In the preparation of its national report, the government of Ireland engaged with civil society through public consultation meetings. Non-governmental organisations play a crucial role in this UPR process through lobbying, consultation with civil society and the preparation of stakeholder's reports.
Dr Vinodh Jaichand Awarded President's Award for teaching excellence.
Dr. Vinodh Jaichand, the Deputy Director of the Irish Centre for Human Rights, has received the President's Award for Teaching Excellence 2010-11. He is one of five persons to receive this award at NUIG which carries a teaching development grant of 1,000 Euro. Congratulations Dr Jaichand !
Dr Shane Darcy awarded the prestigious Journal of International Criminal Justice Prize 2010.
Dr Shane Darcy, a lecturer at the Irish Centre for Human Rights, has been awarded the prestigious Journal of International Criminal Justice Prize 2010. The prize is awarded annually for the best article by a younger scholar in this leading international journal. This year the honour was awarded ex aequo to Dr Shane Darcy and Johan David Michels. Shane's article was entitled 'Prosecuting the War Crime of Collective Punishment: Is It Time to Amend the Rome Statute?' In awarding the prize, the Board of Editors of the journal commended the work for furthering critical discussion of the substantive and procedural law practiced before international criminal courts and tribunals. They praised Dr Darcy for his lucid and thought-provoking reading of the customary and conventional basis of the offence of collective punishment, its judicial application by the Special Court of Sierra Leone and the implications of its omission from the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. The prize was awarded at a ceremony convened at the Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights in Geneva on 10 March 2011, presided over by Judge Antonio Cassese, the President of the Special Tribunal of Lebanon, and Judge Baltasar Garzón, magistrate at the Audiencia Nacional in Spain.
Pictured at the award ceremony are (l-r) Judge Antonio Cassese, President of the Special Tribunal of Lebanon, Dr Shane Darcy, Irish Centre for Human Rights, Judge Baltasar Garzón, Audiencia Nacional , Spain, Johan David Michels, ICTY, and Sandesh Sivakumaran, University of Nottingham
REPORT ON GALWAY TAXI INDUSTRY GOES BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON THE ELIMINATION OF ALL FORMS of RACIAL DISCRIMINATION
Rumours of racist employment practices within the taxi industry of Galway city provoked repeated concern in staff meetings of the Irish Centre for Human Rights in early 2010. Dr Vinodh Jaichand, Deputy Director of the Centre, was tasked with investigating these rumours. With the help of a team of student researchers Dr Jaichand authored a final report, which found evidence to substantiate these rumours, and which has subsequently gained much more attention than was previously hoped for (see page 7 of the latest bulletin for further details).
The report, �€�Riding Along With Racism?�€� was launched at the Centre on December 10th 2010 where a number of Galway�€�s taxi drivers of African descent were present. They gave the event a real sense of relevance and groundedness, and some spoke themselves, in thanks for the production of the report, in hope of it making a real difference and in expression of their personal experiences.
A sizeable amount of media attention and public comment has been garnered, from Galway�€�s local newspapers to the Irish Times and the Irish Examiner. Pieces have been aired on TV3 and TG4 news programmes, and much discussion has been generated on a number of online blogs, websites and posts.
However, it was not foreseen that the report would so soon go to an international audience. In a fortuitous coincidence the Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD), seated in Geneva, was set to consider Ireland�€�s third and fourth periodic reports over the 22nd and 23rd of February 2011. CERD is the treaty body instituted by the Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination to which each state party must report on its obligations under the convention, and to which civil society bodies can issue �€�shadow reports�€� and other information that may not be provided by the government. Usually the process of getting this information considered by CERD and other treaty bodies is quite laborious and painstaking.
Yet despite these obstacles, and with the invaluable help of the CERD Secretariat and the NGO Alliance Against Racism (NAAR, a group of Irish civil society organisations who had collaborated in making a very well prepared formal shadow report) copies of the Centre�€�s taxi report were sent to each member of the Committee and posted on CERD�€�s website. An informal meeting between the members of the Committee and selected representatives of Irish civil society organisations was scheduled for the 22nd of February, and Dr Jaichand was invited to Geneva to participate with representatives of NAAR. Though time was very tight as many organisations were present at the meeting, Dr Jaichand was given a short interval to make a personal presentation and take some questions from the Committee members. He said that �The report was very well received from all quarters and the profile of the Centre was enhanced.�
Also very fortuitously, a member of the original research team, Niamh Aine Ni Bhriain, who spent hours in the cold Galway nights observing behaviour at taxi ranks, was also present at the session. Niamh is a graduate of the Centre�€�s LLM programme and is currently an intern at the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and was greatly encouraged to see their research reach such a qualified audience. Dr Katarina Mansson (who completed a Ph D from the Centre three years ago and now works at the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights) also met Dr Jaichand, by pure coincidence, in the corridors of Palais Wilson on that day!
We now are awaiting the product of CERD�€�s deliberations over Ireland�€�s periodic report in hope that mention may be made in the Committee�€�s concluding observations regarding the government�€�s responsibility to safeguard taxi drivers in Galway and around the State from racial discrimination.
The Centre wishes to extend special thanks to all the researchers who assisted for making it possible for a report that began in a staff meeting to have such a significant impact.
National University of Ireland, Galway
Phone: +353 (0)91 493948, Fax: +353 (0) 91 494575
E-mail: humanrights
nuigalway.ie
This page was last updated Friday, January 27, 2012