Committee Mandate

It is anticipated that the LAWASIA Human Rights Committee will focus activity on the following:

• 1.1    Research into human rights in particular in the Asian Pacific region.
• 1.2    Providing LAWASIA members with information on human rights.
• 1.3    Organising or assisting meetings, sessions and conferences of LAWASIA on human rights issues.
• 1.4    Proposing and/or implementing human rights intervention activities including intervention letters, organizing and researching trial and other observation missions.
• 1.5    Participation in meetings, among others, of bar associations/ law societies, international lawyers’ organizations and international organisations.
• 1.6    Establishing and administrating a LAWASIA Human Rights Award, awarded to lawyers or advocates who have made prominent achievements in human rights in the Asian Pacific region.
• 1.7    Drafting principles for consideration by Council (e.g. principles on separation of command between civil police force and military).
• 1.8    Giving consideration to further development of the draft LAWASIA Pacific Human Rights Charter.

Committee Leaders

Co-Chairs, Human Rights Committee | LAWASIA

Shanmuga Kanesalingam
Kanesalingam & Co. Malaysian Centre for Constitutionalism and Human Rights
MALAYSIA

Shanmuga Kanesalingam is primarily a litigator in the fields of corporate and general litigation, media law, and constitutional and administrative law. 
 
He has acted pro bono for numerous persons who say they were wrongly considered as Muslims when in fact professed and practiced Hinduism. He has also acted for mothers who say their children were unlawfully converted to Islam by their ex-husbands and was lead counsel in the landmark decision of Malaysia’s apex court in Indira Gandhi v Religious Department of Perak (2018) which overturned the conversion certificates of 3 children. 
 
Shan also represented an online news portal in a case establishing a constitutional right to a free press in Malaysia and was involved in several cases challenging bans on books, including successfully overturning a book published by Sisters in Islam; the Malay translation of Irshad Manji’s “Allah, Liberty and Love”; and a collection of cartoons by political satirist Zunar.
 
Together with 5 other lawyers, he co-founded the LoyarBurok blawg (www.loyarburok.com), which featured articles on public interest matters, which now has a physical presence with the establishment of the Malaysian Centre for Constitutionalism and Human Rights (www.mcchr.org) in 2011. In 2015, Shan obtained an LL.M from Columbia Law School with the assistance of a Fulbright scholarship.
 

Arthur Moses SC
New Chambers
AUSTRALIA

Arthur Moses SC has been practicing at the NSW Bar in excess of 25 years. He was appointed Senior Counsel in 2008. He served as President of the NSW Bar Association during the period 2017 to 2018. He also served as President of the Law Council of Australia in 2019. His practice includes administrative law, coronial inquests, corruption inquiries, proceeds of crime litigation, work health and safety prosecutions, employment and industrial law, discrimination, restraints of trade, commercial, equity, sports law and military law cases. He regularly appears before the Federal Court, NSW Court of Appeal, Supreme Court of NSW as well as appellate Courts in other States.

He has appeared in numerous corruption inquiries before ICAC and law enforcement integrity commissions. Mr Moses also regularly appears for the Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police in proceeds of crime matters in various intermediate appellate courts throughout Australia. He has also appeared for the NSW Crime Commission.

Mr Moses SC has presented numerous seminars on topics including legal ethics, apprehension of bias, restraints of trade, employment law, and work health and safety prosecutions for institutions such as the University of NSW, the Australian Defence Force, the Law Council of Australia, the NSW Bar Association and the Judicial Commission of NSW.

Co-Vice Chairs, Human Rights Committee | LAWASIA

Dr Pillkyu Hwang, Esq.
GongGam Human Rights Law Foundation
KOREA

Rebecca Preston
Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights, Canberra
AUSTRALIA

Expert Counsellor  Children, Indigenous people, Gender, Human Rights Committee | LAWASIA

Dr Holly Doel-Mackaway
Macquarie Law School
AUSTRALIA

Expert Counsellor (HR & Environment) Human Rights Committee | LAWASIA

Jayme Cooper
Environmental Defenders Office
AUSTRALIA

Secretary and Expert Counsellor  HR Advocacy & Training, Human Rights Committee | LAWASIA

Firdaus Husni
Malaysian Centre for Constitutionalism and Human Rights
MALAYSIA

Past Human Rights Committee Co-Chairs 

Mr Shyam Divan, Senior Advocate | Supreme Court of India (INDIA) 

Professor Yasushi Higashizawa