KINGSTON, Jamaica – The Director of the Centre for Reparation Research (CRR) at The University of the West Indies (UWI), Professor Verene A. Shepherd, has been re-appointed chair of the United Nations’ Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD).
Professor Verene A. Shepherd (Photo courtesy of Guyana DPI)CERD is the United Nation’s oldest treaty body, and the Committee implements the International Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.
Professor Shepherd, whose candidacy was supported by the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), is the first citizen from the region as well as the first Jamaican to be a member of CERD and to serve as Chair. She will serve in the position for the next two years.
She has been a member of the Committee since 2016, receiving the highest number of votes among those who competed for a seat on the CERD twice in a row. This is the third time that the Social Historian and Reparations Advocate will serve as Chair of the committee, having held four-year terms in 2015 and 2019 respectively.
UWI said that she brings her expertise in administration, history, gender studies, migration studies, reparation and human rights to the position.
She also brings to the CERD, her experience as a member of the United Nation’s Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent (WGEPAD) from 2010-2015, during which time she helped to draft the Program of Activities for the UN’s International Decade for People of African Descent from 2015-2024.
