The Centre of European Law and the Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence in Law and Governance is very pleased to announce the following lecture:
Human Rights Policies – what works and what doesn’t
- SPEAKER: Markus Löning – German Federal Government Commissioner for Human Rights Policy and Humanitarian Aid at the Federal Foreign Office, Berlin
- DATE: Thursday 16th June 2011
- TIME: 18.00
- VENUE: room K2.31, King’s College London, Strand Campus, WC2R 2LS
- COST: Free
Registration Required places limited.
The lecture will be followed by a drinks reception.
Accredited with 1 CPD point, all welcome!
Quite possibly the longest intro to a speaker ever! 7 mins of background info – most, of which had no relevance to the topic (Human Rights) – for example, that the speaker’s family own a fashion shop.Completely baffling!
The talk in itself was sadly generic and superficial. Here we had a politician, a German Human Rights Commissioner, one would have hoped for some insider stories, some personal anecdotes, some real life experiences. Instead, it was a quite superficial overview interjected with a couple of personal opinions , e.g sanctions are pointless, talk is better.
I questioned this – what about South Africa? It was sanctions which led to the end of apartheid and the release of Mandiba. Yes, the speaker conceded, this is perhaps the only example where sanctions worked.
Had some wine and nibbles afterwards in the Council room, talked to an English lawyer about the demise of the English education system especially as regards to teaching languages and grammar. Talked also to a French author who is currently writing a book on European liberalism – we had quite a good discussion on the difference between freedom and liberty. Semantics my dear, semantics.