AAAS Scientific Responsibility, Human Rights and Law Program

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Report on Science and Human Rights

Winter 2002 Vol XXII, No. 1

Staff Highlights

Audrey Chapman co-organized an October workshop in Cape Town for the team of researchers collaborating in SHR’s assessment of the truth-finding methodologies and impact of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission. She continued researching and drafting chapters for an upcoming three-volume publication based on the project’s work. Chapman served as an expert/consultant to the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) for the purpose of drafting a statement on intellectual property and human rights and attended the November session of the Committee in Geneva in conjunction with this assignment.

Patrick Ball has focused on preparations for his upcoming testimony in the trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia. Ball will provide a statistical analysis of the patterns of migration and killing in Kosovo during the period March-June 1999. The patterns are inconsistent with the claim that NATO or KLA activity directly or indirectly caused the killing or migration. However, the patterns support the claim that there was a systematic campaign of ethnic cleansing.

Stephen Hansen, who directs SHR’s project on traditional ecological knowledge systems, is currently working with the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights to draft a general comment on the right to participate in cultural life. He will participate as an international expert on cultural rights at a UNESCO-sponsored International Roundtable on the Right to Take Part in Cultural Life in Manila in February 2002. Sage Russell coordinates SHR’s project on human rights and the environment. She drafted the Program’s submission to a January 2002 meeting on integrating human rights and environmental concerns, which was organized by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the UN Environment Programme.

Victoria Baxter co-organized the December symposium on the impact of the War on Terrorism on scientific freedom and human rights. She has continued her work on the Right to Travel project, which focuses on Cuba. Baxter has been busy planning the Annual Human Rights Reception at the 2002 AAAS Annual Meeting in Boston, which will honor the human rights work of Dr. Moncef Marzouki of Tunisia.

Matt Zimmerman worked with Patrick Ball to create a computerized system for identifying and reconciling matching reports of political killings in Kosovo from different sources. Zimmerman has also made a number of improvements to the Science and Human Rights Program website, including a redesigned AAAS Human Rights Action Network site (http://shr.aaas.org/aaashran).

Jason Sanders helped coordinate and support SHR events and projects, including those listed above. In addition to working with Amazon.com to develop more fully SHR’s on-line sales of publications, he has been developing an in-house tracking and invoicing system for SHR publications sold directly.