Hadar Harris

Hadar Harris "is the Executive Director of the Center for Human Rights and Humanitarian Law at American University Washington College of Law in Washington, DC. She is an international human rights attorney and specializes in issues of civil and political rights, gender equality, prevention and punishment of genocide, and domestic implementation of international norms. She has worked extensively in assessing and reviewing national compliance with international human rights treaties working both with NGOs and governmental bodies. In Spring 2002, she piloted an assessment tool developed by the American Bar Association/CEELI to review national compliance with the provisions of the Convention for the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).  The pilot project was run in Armenia and the final report was submitted for review to the United Nations and to the Armenian government. She has also consulted on implementation of the assessment tool in Serbia, Kazakhstan, Georgia and Macedonia. She assisted in developing shadow reports to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) with the Association for Civil Rights in Israel and since 2004 has worked with the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Treaty Implementation of the Government of Botswana to assist it in developing its State Party report to the United Nations Committee for the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD) as well as its State Party report to CEDAW. She has also assisted UNMIK and the Government of Kosovo in preparation of a supplemental report to CEDAW. She serves on the National Coordinating Task Force for US Treaty Compliance, providing technical assistance on preparation of coordinated shadow reports being developed by a large coalition of US-based organizations on United States compliance with the ICCPR and ICERD. She is also on the Training Committee of the US Human Rights Network. In addition, Ms. Harris has worked on a variety of other human rights issues. In 2002, she consulted on proposed reforms to the Moroccan Criminal Procedure Code which resulted in 70% of recommended changes being adopted by the Moroccan parliament. In 2001, she was involved in a trial on behalf of four Bosnian Muslims suing their Serbian torturer in US Federal Court in Atlanta, Georgia which resulted in nearly $140 million in damages being awarded to the victims. Over the past three years, she has helped to create the first-ever network of legal academics and activists discussing gender mainstreaming and legal education in India, the Gender and Law Association of India (GALA). Ms. Harris has worked as an international election observer with the UN/OSCE joint mission in Azerbaijan and taught law at Khazar University in Baku. She also lived and worked in Jerusalem where she was the Director of Program and Resource Development for the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI). She formerly served as the Executive Director of the Congressional Human Rights Caucus, a bipartisan legislative service organization of the United States House of Representatives. Ms. Harris has her BA in Political Science from Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island and her Juris Doctor in Law from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)."


 * Faculty Advisory Committee, Center for Democracy and Election Management