As of 1 April, Dina Lupin and Maria Antonia Tigre have stepped down from their roles as Director and Deputy Director of the Global Network for Human Rights and the Environment (the GNHRE). They have both been part of the management team of the GNHRE for many years, and in that time have worked to build the Network and to expand its important role in research, advocacy, and global collaboration on human rights and the environment. While they are stepping away to focus on new projects, both professional and personal, both will remain involved in the work and activities of the GNHRE. The GNHRE wishes to thank Dina and Maria Antonia for their very valuable contribution in leading the GNHRE.

The GNHRE is excited to welcome Claudia Ituarte-Lima as new GNHRE Director and Liliana Lizarazo-Rodriguez as GNHRE Deputy Director. Natalia Urzola and Victoria Lichet will continue to serve as chief operating officers and support our growing programs and activities.

As a recognized international public lawyer and scholar, Dr. Claudia Ituarte-Lima brings to the GNHRE over two decades of expertise in the intersection of international human rights, biodiversity and climate law and policy. She holds a PhD (University College London) and a MPhil (University of Cambridge) and is thematic lead on human rights and environment and senior researcher at the Raoul Wallenberg Institute. Her research, which has been published in seven languages, unites legal analysis and sustainability science for examining environmental and human rights governance challenges and innovative levers to address them. She has played a pivotal role in advancing the integration of human rights into the Convention on Biological Diversity’s Conference of the Parties’ Decisions. Her research expertise is complemented by her experiential learning by living in Sweden, Mexico, Kenya, Japan, Canada, Peru and Ecuador. In catalyzing dialogue and collaboration within and across GNHRE members in distinct regions, she will also build on her experience conducting impactful dialogue processes and courses in various countries including with judges, public prosecutors, National Human Rights Institutions, environmental policy-makers and UN agencies.

Liliana Lizarazo-Rodriguez is Research Professor of Sustainable Development Law and Sustainable Development and Global Governance at the Brussels School of Governance, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium). She is Principal Investigator of the European Research Council (ERC) grant Curiae Virides. She holds honorary positions as Associate Researcher at IPIS research (Belgium) and Fellow at Sustainability College Bruges (Belgium). She is also the director of other research projects, such as the Horizon Europe MSC Mother Earth. At the VUB, she is also one of the promoters of the HOST project, the House of Sustainability Transitions and the Ecotrilema project. Her areas of expertise are access to justice in transnational environmental disputes, responsible corporate behaviour in sustainability issues and empirical legal studies on judicial activism. Liliana studied Law (Universidad del Rosario (Colombia) and UNED (Spain)), Development studies (University of Antwerp (IOB)) and obtained her PhD at the University of Ghent (Belgium). You can consult her publications at ORCID  and the Research Portal of the VUB.