SIPA alum Ana Cutter Patel returned to Columbia University in her new role as the US representative of Front Line Defenders (FLD), an international human rights organization founded in Dublin in 2001 with the specific aim of protecting human rights defenders (HRDs) at risk. Ana accompanied the Interim Director of FLD, Olive Moore, as they presented the organization’s Global Analysis 2022, an in-depth annual publication detailing the variety of risks, threats and attacks faced by HRDs around the world, to participants in the 2022-23 Human Rights Advocates Program (HRAP) at the Institute for the Study of Human Rights (ISHR). Olive opened the presentation by remarking that it was appropriate for FLD to have their first presentation of the report in the USA with a group of human rights advocates. The 2022-23 HRAP is made up of the 10 advocates working on issues including LGBTQI rights in the DRC, South Africa, Ethiopia and Brazil, the right to citizenship in the Dominican Republic, women’s rights in Haiti and indigenous people’s rights in Mexico and Bolivia.
