Hina Jilani

Hina Jilani is a pioneering lawyer and human rights defender. As an Advocate of the Supreme Court of Pakistan, she has conducted landmark cases setting new human rights standards in the country with particular concern to the more vulnerable populations, including women, minorities, children and prisoners. She created Pakistan’s first all-women law firm and co-founded Pakistan’s first legal aid center. She also founded its national Human Rights Commission and the Women's Action Forum, a campaign group that advocated for women’s rights and challenged the discriminatory laws with which she had grown up.

Beginning in 2000, she served eight years as the first United Nations Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Human Rights Defenders, where she focused on addressing human rights violations and analyzing the experiences of human rights defenders around the world. In 2004, she was appointed by the United Nations Security Council to serve as a member of the International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur. Ms. Jilani was appointed a member of the Eminent Jurists Panel on Human Rights and Counter Terrorism by the International Commission of Jurists from 2006 until 2008, and was a member of the United Nations Fact-Finding Mission on Gaza in April 2009. In 2013, she was elected to the International Commission of Jurists.

Ms. Jilani has received a number of honors and awards, including the 2001 Millennium Peace Prize for Women, the International Human Rights Lawyer Award of the American Bar Association’s Section of International Law and the Amnesty International Genetta Sagan Award for Women’s Rights, among others.