Norah Niland

Norah Niland has spent most of her professional life with the United Nations, both in the field (including assignments in Sri Lanka, Thailand, Cambodia, Liberia and Afghanistan), and at HQ working on humanitarian, human rights and development issues. She is now an independent researcher; she separated from the UN in January 2011 having departed Afghanistan a few months earlier on completion of her assignment as director of human rights in UNAMA and representative of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Before this, Ms Niland was in charge of policy development with the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Geneva. In 2003, Norah spent a sabbatical year with the Human Security Institute, Tufts University, as a visiting research fellow. A published author, Norah has an MPhil in Peace Studies from Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland.