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Between 1989 and 2023, more than 350 advocates from nearly 100 countries have attended the program. HRAP participants have ranged from early-career advocates who cut their teeth in very urgent human rights situations to mid-career advocates who have founded organizations. HRAP alumni have served as UN special rapporteurs, in the ministries of their governments, and at leading human rights organizations around the globe. They have been recognized with honors including the Rafto Prize, the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award and the Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders, the highest acknowledgment from the international human rights community.
Below are the biographies of current Advocates and descriptions by select alumni as to why they became human rights advocates.
To see a list of additional past Advocates click here.
To read about more about the work of our Advocates click here .
Uganda, 2011
Senior Regional Director, Africa, Center for Reproductive Rights
Salima Namusobya is the Senior Regional Director, of Africa at the Center for Reproductive Rights. Her previous role was as the Executive Director of the Initiative for Social and Economic Rights and an expert member of the Working Group on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights. She is a lawyer and human rights advocate who has specialized in international human rights law and forced migration. Previously, she worked in various capacities with the Refugee Law Project, School of Law, Makerere University, and also served as the Eastern Africa Coordinator for International Law in Domestic Courts. Namusobya holds a Bachelor of Law Degree, a diploma in Legal Practice, and a Master of Laws in Human Rights and Democratization. She co-wrote the textbook “Civil Procedure and Practice in Uganda” and contributed a chapter for the book “Litigating Health Rights in Africa.” She also serves on the boards of several local and international NGOs and is a member of the Steering Committee of the Strategic Litigation Working Group of the Global Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Network. Namusobya is a laureate of the Vera Chirwa Human Rights Award
