Dr. Miriam Estrada-Castillo of the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention will lead us in the urgent matter of defending artists who face disappearance and arrest, and how to defend their rights, providing valuable insight into the Key Mandate of the UN WGAD.

Dr Miriam Estrada-Castillo is a Professor of International Law, International Criminal Law and Human Rights and the Director of the UNESCO Chair at Casa Grande University of Guayaquil, Ecuador. She is also a Visiting Professor at Bards College (NY/Palestine). Professor Estrada worked for the United Nations Security Council Counter- Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate (CTED) and as an International Prosecutor at Timor-Leste being part of the first 100 Brahimi Civilian Experts deployed in a Peacekeeping Mission by the UN. She is a former Vice-chairperson of the Committee for the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and a member of the group which drafted the CEDAW Optional Protocol. Dr Estrada was the Latin America Regional Adviser on Gender, Human Rights and Culture of Peace for UNESCO.

“Art and human rights, however dissimilar they may seem, are directly related and intrinsically connected to the deepest sense of freedom and dignity rooted in the inscrutable emotions of a humanity yearning for justice, for fairness, for a voice to be heard. Their conquests have implied struggles and resistance, as if the very act of progress demands the breaking of old chains and the dismantling of obsolete walls. Ironically, it is in these acts of demolition of what once was that new visions emerge, and both human rights and art find their true power: in renewal, in rebirth, in the fearless pursuit of a more just and beautiful world.” – Dr. Miriam Estrada-Castillo