Bio
Becky Farrar
Attorney-at-law, Washington, D.C.
Anne T. Gallagher
Technical Director, Asia Regional Trafficking in Persons Project; Head of Operations, Equity International; independent scholar and legal adviser. Ph.D., University of Utrecht; M.Int.L (Australian National University); BA, LLB (Macquarie University).
Olufunmi Oluyede
Olufunmi Oluyede is partner at Trlplaw in Lagos, Nigeria.
Jonathan Todres
Jonathan Todres is an Associate Professor of Law at Georgia State University's College of Law. As a member of the core faculty of the Center for Law, Health & Society, he teaches Human Rights and Children, Public Health Law, International and Comparative Health Law, and Torts.
Previously, Professor Todres served as Acting Assistant Professor at New York University School of Law and Adjunct Professor of Law at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University.
He serves as a regular advisor to non-governmental organizations working to combat commercial sexual exploitation of children. He is the co-editor of U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child: An Analysis of Treaty Provisions and Implications of U.S. Ratification (2006) and a number of articles on children's rights and health law issues.
Samantha Vardaman
Samantha Vardaman is the lead on policy issues for Shared Hope International coordinating advocacy efforts to further the protection of sex trafficking victims. After directing a rule of law program in Moldova for three years in which human trafficking issues figured prominently, Samantha joined Shared Hope International in July 2005 to direct the Trafficking Markets project, resulting in the research report and documentary titled DEMAND, which compares sex trafficking markets in four countries: Jamaica, Japan, the Netherlands, and the United States. In 2006, she began directing a three-year research project in ten U.S. locations into the sex trafficking of American and lawful permanent resident minors in the United States funded by the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Assistance. The project led to published assessments of the identification and delivery of services to victims of child sex trafficking in each of the 10 locations, as well as training resources for first responders new to the issue. Four more locations were assessed in 2009 and 2010. The research was compiled into the National Report on Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking: America's Prostituted Children, released in July 2009 at a Congressional briefing to highlight the issue of child sex trafficking in America and admitted into the Congressional Record as evidence of the scope of the problem of child sex trafficking in the U.S. In 2011, Samantha designed and led the Protected Innocence Legislative Framework and Initiative, establishing minimum standards for the protection and response to child sex trafficking at the state level, leading to the December 2011 release of the first annual Protected Innocence Challenge Report Cards grading each state's framework of laws in order to provide the blueprint for comprehensive legislative action for each state. At the same time, Samantha oversees the implementation of restoration programs at Shared Hope International, which includes technical assistance and best practices dissemination for service and shelter providers, as well as grant funding to service providers in the U.S., Fiji, Jamaica, India and Nepal.
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Encyclopædia Britannica Article
- international law
Body of legal rules, norms, and standards that apply between sovereign states and other entities that are legally recognized as international actors. The term was coined by the English philosopher Jeremy Bentham. Important elements of international law include sovereignty, recognition (which allows a country to honour the claims of another), consent (which allows for modifications in international agreements to fit the customs of a country), freedom of the high seas, self-defense (which ensures that measures may be taken against illegal acts committed against a sovereign country), freedom of commerce, and protection of nationals abroad. International courts, such as the International Court of Justice, resolve disputes on these and other matters, including war crimes. See also asylum; immunity.
- international law on britannica.com
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