Ms Hina Jilani

WHO Commissioner on Social Connection

Ms. Hina Jilani is a prominent Pakistani lawyer and human rights advocate. She specializes in human rights and constitutional rights litigation, both in class action and individual cases. She has been invited by prominent academic institutions to teach courses on international human rights law, including University of Oxford, the University of Pennsylvania Law School and the Georgetown University Law School.

In 1980 she co-founded the first all women law firm and the first Legal Aid organization in Pakistan. She is current Chair of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, an NGO that she co-founded in 1986. She is also the Founding Trustee of Dastak Charitable Trust, a globally known women’s shelter and Centre for Access to Justice for women and children.

She served as the Special Representative of the UN Secretary General on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders, and was member of international commissions of inquiry on serious human rights violations constituted by the United Nations. She was a member of the ICJ Eminent Jurists Panel on Human Rights and Counter Terrorism in by the ICJ in 2006. She is a member of the Elders, a group of global independent leaders established by Nelson Mandela to work for human rights, peace and democracy. She is currently serving as the President of the World Organization against Torture (OMCT).

Ms. Jilani is the recipient of numerous human rights awards for her legal and human rights work internationally as well as in Pakistan and South Asia. She has been awarded the Honorary Doctorate in Laws (honoris causa) by Trinity College, Dublin in 2016 and by the Roehampton University, United Kingdom, in 2009.