IACHR
Press Release
IACHR Assigns Rapporteurships
January 31, 2014
Washington, D.C. — The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) held a working meeting on January 30 - 31, 2014, with the incorporation of Commissioners Paulo Vannuchi, a citizen of Brazil, and James L. Cavallaro, a citizen of the United States, who were elected in June 2013 during the 43d ordinary period of sessions of the OAS General Assembly held in La Antigua, Guatemala. As part of the work of the Inter-American Commission during the meeting, Thematic and Country Rapporteurships were distributed. The Commissioners are José de Jesús Orozco Henríquez, President; Tracy Robinson, First Vice-President; Rosa María Ortiz, Second Vice-President; and Commissioners Felipe González, Rose-Marie Belle Antoine, Paulo Vannuchi and James Cavallaro.
The Rapporteurships are now distributed as follows:
Commissioner José de Jesús Orozco Henríquez: Rapporteur for Antigua and Barbuda, Colombia, Costa Rica, Grenada, Panama and Saint Kitts and Nevis, and Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders.
Commissioner Tracy Robinson: Rapporteur for Bahamas, Honduras, Nicaragua, Suriname; Rapporteur on the Rights of Women; and Rapporteur on the Rights of Lesbian, Gay, Transsexual Bisexual and Intersex Persons (LGTBI).
Commissioner Rosa María Ortiz: Rapporteur for Belize, Dominica, El Salvador, Dominican Republic, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Saint Lucia, and Rapporteur on the Rights of the Child.
Commissioner Felipe González: Rapporteur for Brazil, Cuba, United States and Venezuela, and Rapporteur on the Rights of Migrants.
Commissioner Rose-Marie Belle Antoine: Rapporteur for Canada, Chile, Ecuador, Haiti and Jamaica; Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples; and Rapporteur on the Rights of Afro Descendants and against Racial Discrimination.
Commissioner Paulo Vannuchi: Rapporteur for Argentina, Bolivia, Paraguay and Uruguay, and Commissioner responsible of the Unit on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.
Commissioner James L. Cavallaro: Rapporteur for Barbados, Guatemala, Guyana, Mexico, Peru and Trinidad and Tobago, and Rapporteur on the Rights of Persons Deprived of Liberty.
Commissioner José de Jesús Orozco Henríquez is a citizen of Mexico. He was elected during the 39th regular period of sessions of the OAS General Assembly in June 2009 for the standard four-year term, which began on January 1, 2010. On June 6, 2013, the General Assembly reelected him for a second term, which will begin on January 1, 2014 and end on December 31, 2017. He is a researcher in constitutional law, human rights, the judiciary, and comparative law, among other areas, at the Legal Research Institute of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). Previously, he served for 16 years as a Magistrate on Mexico's highest electoral courts, first in the Central Chamber of the Federal Electoral Court and then in the Higher Chamber of the Electoral Court of the Judiciary. He earned a Doctor of Law degree with honors from UNAM, and a Master of Comparative Law from the University of California, Los Angeles, as well as Doctor Honoris Causa for San Martín de Porres University in Peru, and for the Autonomous University of Coahuila, Mexico. He is the author or co-author of 8 books and the coordinator or editor of another 15, and he has written more than 100 articles for academic publications.
Tracy Robinson is a citizen of Jamaica. She was elected at the 41st OAS General Assembly in June 2011 for the standard four-year term, which began on January 1, 2012. She is a lawyer and teaches Gender and the Law, Constitutional Law and Commonwealth Caribbean Human Rights, among other law subjects, at the University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica. She has been a consultant for international agencies such as the United Nations Fund for Women and UNICEF, and she has advised Caribbean governments on topics related to legislation on gender and children rights, among others. Commissioner Robinson has been editor of the Caribbean Law Bulletin and she has written and published reports on a range of topics, including gender, the rights of LGTBI persons, sexual harassment, sexual rights, sex work and the law, and the rights of the child. She has a Bachelor of Law from University of the West Indies and an LLM from the University of Yale, as well as a Bachelor of Civil Law (BCL) from Oxford University.
Rosa María Ortiz is a citizen of Paraguay. She was elected at the 41st OAS General Assembly in June 2011 for the standard four-year term, which began on January 1, 2012. She graduated in social communications media and is an expert in children’s human rights. She has been Vice-President of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child and adviser on human rights and cultural diversity for the Paraguayan Presidency’s National Secretariat of Culture. She is founder and member of several human rights organizations, including Decidamos, Global, Tekoha, Callescuela and Workshop on Communication and Popular Education. In 2003 she was recognized with the award Paraguayan Women of the Paraguayan Presidency’s Women’s Secretariat, and in 2010 she received the award Peter Benenson for the Defense of Human Rights from the Paraguay Section of Amnesty International. During Alfredo Stroessner’s dictatorship, she worked through ecumenical organizations in favor of the political prisoners of her country. Commissioner Ortiz has offered numerous conferences, workshops and has written articles on the rights of children.
Felipe González is a citizen of Chile. He was elected during the 37th regular period of sessions of the OAS General Assembly in 2007 for the standard four-year term, which began on January 1, 2008. He was reelected in 2011 for a second term, which started January 1, 2012. He was the IACHR Chair in 2010. Commissioner González is Professor of International Human Rights Law and Constitutional Law at Chile’s Diego Portales University. He founded and directed that university’s Human Rights Center, where from 2002 to 2006 he managed the preparation and publication of an Annual Report on Human Rights in Chile. He also founded and coordinated a Latin American Network of Legal Human Rights Clinics. He is S.J.D. from the Carlos III University of Madrid, and he holds a Master of Law degree from American University and a Master of Advanced Human Rights Studies from Carlos III University. He is a Professor at the Academy on Human Rights and Humanitarian Law at American University and a Visiting Professor at Carlos III University. Previously he has been a Visiting Professor at the University of Wisconsin, Lund University, the University of Deusto, and the University of Alcalá de Henares. He also worked for the International Human Rights Law Group (now Global Rights), first in Washington, D.C., and then in Santiago, Chile.
Rose-Marie Belle Antoine has dual citizenship of Saint Lucia and Trinidad and Tobago. She was elected at the 41st OAS General Assembly in June 2011 for the standard four-year term, which began on January 1, 2012. She is a lawyer, Professor and Dean of the University of the West Indies, specializing in human rights, financial law, comparative law, administrative law, public service law, discrimination law and labor law. She has also lectured abroad, including in the United States. Commissioner Antoine has substantial international consultancy experience. She has served as senior legal advisor to all of the governments of the Commonwealth Caribbean and to governments outside of the region, such as the UK, Venezuela, USA and Canada, and to several international and regional organizations. These include the European Union, UNICEF, UNIFEM, the ILO, the IADB, the World Bank, and the OAS, among others. She is an award-winning author who has written eleven books and numerous reports and articles and drafted laws on a wide range of topics, including discrimination, constitutional reform, public service reform, juvenile justice, mutual legal assistance, women’s rights, health, sexual harassment, trafficking in persons, labor law, free movement of labor, HIV, financial law, anti-drug trafficking and anti-corruption. Commissioner Antoine is an Oxford Commonwealth Scholar and a Cambridge Pegasus Scholar, holding a doctorate from Oxford University, an LL.M. from Cambridge and an LL.B. from the University of the West Indies. Professor Antoine also holds diplomas and certificates in international human rights from the International Institute of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France.
Commissioner Paulo Vannuchi is a citizen of Brazil. He was elected during the 43rd regular session of the OAS General Assembly in June 2013 for the prescribed four-year term, which began on January 1, 2014. Paulo Vannuchi is a political and union consultant. During his youth, he was imprisoned for five years due to his activities in the resistance to the military dictatorship in Brazil. He studied journalism at the University of São Paulo, where he received a Master’s Degree in Political Science. He was a member of the team that conducted the investigation “Brazil: Never Again”; was a cofounder of the Cajamar Institute; and was a political adviser to the national office of the Workers Party of Brazil. He also served as Executive Secretary of the National Coordinating Committee of the Lula for President Campaign in 1994 and 2002. He held various posts, including that of President, at the Citizenship Institute, coordinated by Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. He served as Human Rights Minister in the Lula Government, between December 21, 2005 and December 31, 2010, as well as President of the Human Rights Defense Council; the National Commission for the Eradication of Slave Labor; and of the National Committee to Prevent and Combat Torture in Brazil. He is the author of articles and publications on political science and human rights, among other topics.
Commissioner James L. Cavallaro is a citizen of the United States. He was elected during the 43rd regular session of the OAS General Assembly in June 2013 for the prescribed four-year term, which began on January 1, 2014. James L. Cavallaro is a lawyer with an undergraduate degree from Harvard College, as well as a law degree from the University of California at Berkeley. Currently, James L. Cavallaro is a Professor of Law at Stanford Law School and Founding Director of both the International Human Rights and Conflict Resolution Clinic at Stanford and the Stanford Human Rights Center. Previously, he was a Clinical Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and Executive Director of the Human Rights Program at Harvard. He founded the Brazil-based Global Justice Center and served as Director of the Brazil offices of Human Rights Watch and the Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL). He is the author of dozens of articles, books, and other publications on human rights and the inter-American human rights system.
A principal, autonomous body of the Organization of American States (OAS), the IACHR derives its mandate from the OAS Charter and the American Convention on Human Rights. The Inter-American Commission has a mandate to promote respect for human rights in the region and acts as a consultative body to the OAS in this area. The Commission is composed of seven independent members who are elected in an individual capacity by the OAS General Assembly and who do not represent their countries of origin or residence.
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