Colombia: UN Human Rights Chief appoints Antonia Urrejola as international human rights expert

GENEVA (26 July 2023) - UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk has appointed Antonia Urrejola as international human rights expert on obstacles to the implementation of the 2016 Peace Agreement, following a request from the UN Human Rights Council.

The Council adopted resolution 53/22 (A/HRC/RES/53/22) on 13 July 2023 requesting the appointment of an international human rights expert mandated with identifying and verifying the obstacles to the implementation of the 2016 Peace Agreement, particularly those publicly announced by the Colombian Special Jurisdiction for Peace in March 2023.

Urrejola will also be tasked with identifying the consequences of these obstacles to the full enjoyment of human rights under international law, as well as the domestic right to peace as enshrined in the Political Constitution of Colombia, and to make recommendations that would help overcome them.

She will submit a report to the Council before the end of 2023 and present it to the Council’s 55th session, followed by an inter-active dialogue.

Urrejola, a Chilean national, is a lawyer specialising in human rights and indigenous peoples’ rights. She served as Foreign Minister of Chile from March 2022 to March 2023 and was Commissioner of the Inter American Commission on Human Rights from 2018-2021 and its President in 2021. She is a human rights professor in the Alberto Hurtado University of Chile and a professor on public policy at the University of Chile.