Peace and Governance Personnel
Obijiofor Aginam
Academic Programme Officer, Director of Studies on Policy and Institutional Frameworks
Obi Aginam was educated in Nigeria and Canada. He holds law degrees from the University of Nigeria and Nigerian Law School; master of laws from Queen's University at Kingston, Canada, and a Ph.D. in law from the University of British Columbia. Before joining UNU, he held a tenured academic position as associate professor of law at Carleton University, Ottawa, where he taught and researched legal topics in international law, human rights, globalization, global health and environmental governance, and third world approaches to international law. From 1999 to 2001, he was Global Health Leadership Fellow and legal officer at the World Health Organization headquarters, Geneva, where he worked on legal and regulatory approaches to global health governance. He has extensive work experience in human rights and environmental law advocacy with leading Nigerian law firms and civil society organizations.
Dr. Aginam has held numerous fellowships including the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) of New York Fellow on Global Security and Cooperation, and Fellow of the 21st Century Trust, U.K. He has been a visiting professor at the University for Peace, Costa Rica, International University of Peoples' Institutions for Peace, Rovereto, Italy, and the University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. He has served as international law consultant for a number of national and international agencies. He is an active member of the Academic Council on the United Nations System (ACUNS), and the Canadian Council on International Law (CCIL). He has been a recipient of the competitive research grant of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) of Canada.
Recent Books include:
Global Health Governance: International Law and Public Health in a Divided World
(Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005)
(With David Fidler, Nick Drager and Carlos Correa), Legal Review of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) From a Public Health Perspective
(Geneva: World Health Organization, 2006)
(With Obiora C. Okafor), Humanizing Our Global Order: Essays in Honour of Ivan Head
(Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003)
In addition to numerous chapters in edited books, his publications have appeared in a number of journals including: Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies, Chicago Journal of International Law, American Society of International Law (ASIL) Proceedings, Bulletin of the World Health Organization, North Carolina Journal of International Law & Commercial Regulation, New England Journal of International and Comparative Law, Temple Law Review, Journal of Maritime Law and Commerce, Law, Social Justice and Global Development, Yearbook of International Environmental Law, and many others.
Maleeha Aslam
JSPS-UNU Postdoctoral Fellow
Maleeha Aslam completed her education in Pakistan and the United Kingdom. She holds an M.Sc. in international relations from Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, and an M.Phil. in development studies and Ph.D. in gender and Islam, both from University of Cambridge, UK. Prior to joining UNU she was working as a consultant for UNDP regarding its One UN Programme and was also employed at the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) in Islamabad as a research fellow (gender). Her postdoctoral project aims to unfold the complex nexus between religious extremism and dynamics of gender (masculinity) in the Muslim world. Her research identifies peculiar forms of gender constructions as potent causes of local and global level terrorism. The research aims at recommending peaceful and sustainable solutions as strategies for counterterrorism.
Dr. Aslam remains associated with SDPI as a visiting fellow.
Madoka Futamura
Academic Programme Officer, Director of Studies on Human Rights and Ethics
Madoka Futamura was educated in Japan and the UK. She holds a Ph.D. in war studies from King's College London, and also holds an M.Sc. in international relations from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and a B.A. in law from Doshisha University (Kyoto, Japan). Before joining UNU in January 2008, she was a visiting research fellow with the War Crimes Research Group at King's College London and taught courses related to international relations at Doshisha University. She has also received a RIPS-CGP Fellowship from the Research Institute for Peace and Security (Tokyo, Japan).
Dr. Futamura's research interests include multidisciplinary subject areas such as transitional justice, war crimes trials, international peace and security. Her works include: War Crimes Tribunals and Transitional Justice: The Tokyo Trial and the Nuremberg Legacy (Routledge, 2008); (co-eds with James Gow) Dark Histories, Brighter Futures? The Balkans and Black Sea Region― European Union Frontiers, War Crimes and Confronting the Past [Special Issue for Journal of Southeast European and Black Sea Studies, Vol.7, No.3, 2007]. She has also contributed chapters for several books on human rights and international society: 'Kokusai Hōteino Mokutekito Kinō: Nyurunberukuno Isanto Ikōkino Seigi no Kyōkun' (Strategic Purposes of International War Crimes Trials: the Nuremberg Legacy and Lessons of Transitional Justice), in Toru Oga and Yoneyuki Sugita (eds.), Kokusaishakaino Igito Genkai: Riron, Shisō, Rekishi (Kokusai Shoin, forthcoming); 'Adohokku Kokusai Keijisaibanshoto Posuto Reisenjidaino Kokusai Anzen Hoshō' (International Criminal Tribunals and Post-Cold War International Peace and Security), in Ajia-Taiheiyō Jinken Jōhō Sentā, (ed.), Ajia-Taiheiyō Jinken Rebyu 2005 (Tokyo: Gendai Jinbunsha, 2005).
Mark Notaras
Research Assistant
Mark Notaras holds a masters in international affairs (specialising in peace and conflict studies) completed with merit at the Australian National University and the International Peace Research Institute, Oslo (PRIO), as well as a bachelor of commerce (in government, with honours) from the University of Sydney. Prior to joining the UNU as a researcher, he was programme manager for the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID) Vietnam Programme, as well as an active member of Amnesty International, St Vincent de Paul and other civil society organisations. From 2006 to 2008, he volunteered with refugee communities in Sydney and Canberra in managing Australian refugee NGO Triumphant International, and as founding director of the Australian Refugee Film Festival.
His research interests include democratisation, sustainable development, identity and conflict, peacebuilding and humanitarian affairs. His first edited volume Democracy in the South: Participation, the State and the People (with Brendan Howe and Vesselin Popovski, UNU Press) will be released in early 2010. He is a writer/editor for the UNU Media Studio and the UNU's web magazine Our World 2.0.
Vesselin Popovski
Senior Academic Programme Officer, Director of Studies on International Order and Justice
Vesselin Popovski is a former diplomat (1988-1996), UN desk officer at the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry, and later first secretary at the Bulgarian Embassy in London. He holds master's degrees in international relations from the Moscow Institute of International Affairs (1988) and from the London School of Economics (1996), and a Ph.D. from King's College, London, on the methodology of analysis and classification of UN Security Council resolutions. Other positions include: research fellowship at NATO Academic Program "Democratic Institutions" (1996–98); lecturer and programme director at the Centre for European Studies, Exeter University, UK (1999–2002); visiting lecturer at King's College, London; as well as work at the Centre for the Study of Democracy, Westminster University and Huron University (USA). He is a contributor to the ICISS Report Responsibility to Protect (2001) and co-author of the Princeton Principles of Universal Jurisdiction (2001). From 2002 to 2004 he worked for the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights in Moscow, implementing the European Union Project "Legal Protection of Individual Rights in Russia". He has published on intervention, human rights, International Criminal Court, and UN reforms. His most recent books are International Criminal Accountability and the Rights of Children (co-edited with K. Arts, Hague Academic Press, 2006) and World Religions and Norms of War (UNU Press, 2008).
Ms. Yoshie Sawada
Programme Administrative Assistant
Johanna Stratton
Academic Programme Associate
Johanna Stratton is an Australian lawyer with degrees in Asian studies (Japan) and in law (honours) from the Australian National University. She received a master's degree in peace and conflict studies with distinction while holding a Rotary World Peace Fellowship. Prior to joining the UNU, she served as regional coordinator for the Northeast Asian process of the Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict (GPPAC), where she worked with civil society organizations and academic institutions in the region to develop expertise and cooperation in the field of conflict prevention and peace-building. She has also worked for the international NGO Peace Boat both at sea and in their Tokyo office, and provided pro bono assistance to the Japanese lawyers' collective Human Rights Now. Her research interests include gender and conflict, forced migration, democratic governance, and international criminal justice.
Nicholas Turner
Academic Programme Associate
Nicholas Turner completed his M.A. in international relations from the University of Kent in the UK, and previously worked for local government and charities there. His specific research interests lie in human rights and ethics, focusing in particular on Just War theory, the universalism/cultural relativism debate, the Responsibility to Protect, and assessing the legal and ethical justifications of human rights derogations. He is currently engaged in research into the ethical implications of non-state actors in military conflict, including the increasing role of private military companies. He recently completed the book World Religions and Norms of War (co-edited with Gregory M. Reichberg and Vesselin Popovski, UNU Press: 2009).
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Page last modified 2019.04.16.