UN Special Rapporteur special guest at Journalism Asia Forum 2010
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Frank La Rue, the UN Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Opinion and Expression, will serve as a special guest speaker at the Journalism Asia Forum 2010 on November 23.
The Manila-based Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility (CMFR) is holding JAF 2010 on November 23 to mark the first year anniversary of the Ampatuan (Maguindanao) massacre, in which fifty-eight people including 32 journalists and media workers were murdered in the Maguindanao province.
Mr. La Rue’s specific mandate is to promote and protect the right to freedom of opinion and expression, including the right to seek, receive and impart information.
Mr. La Rue has worked on human rights for the past 25 years. He is the founder of the Center for Legal Action for Human Rights (CALDH), both in Washington DC and Guatemala, which became the first Guatemalan NGO to bring cases of human rights violations to the Inter-American System. CALDH was also the first Guatemalan NGO to promote economic, social and cultural rights. Mr. La Rue also brought the first genocide case against the military dictatorship in Guatemala. As a human rights activist, his name was presented to the Nobel Peace Prize committee in 2004.
La Rue has previously served as a Presidential Commissioner for Human Rights in Guatemala, as a Human Rights Adviser to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Guatemala and as a consultant to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. He is President of Instituto Demos, a research center in Guatemala City that promotes democratic alternatives in the country, under the human rights framework. Within the organization, there is a research team which supports the mandate of the United Nation’s Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression and Opinion, in the making of his annual reports before the United Nations Human Rights Council.
La Rue holds a BA in Legal and Social Sciences from the University of San Carlos, Guatemala and a postgraduate degree in U.S. foreign policy from Johns Hopkins University.
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