Juan E Méndez is a Professor of Human Rights Law in Residence at the American University – Washington College of Law, where he is Faculty Director of the Anti-Torture Initiative, a project of WCL’s Center for Human Rights and Humanitarian Law.
He is a member of the three-person International Independent Expert Mechanism on Racial Justice and Law Enforcement, appointed by the UN Human Rights Council in December 2021. He was a member of the International Group of Independent Experts (GIEI) that investigated the acts of violence in Bolivia between September and December of 2019. In July 2020 Mr. Mendez started a three-year term as a member of the Board of Trustees of the UN Voluntary Fund for the Victims of Torture. He was the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment or Punishment between November 1, 2010 and October 31, 2016.
The Honorable Kofi Annan named Mr. Méndez his Special Advisor on the Prevention of Genocide, a task he performed from 2004 to 2007. Between 2000 and 2003 he was a member of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights of the Organization of American States and served as its President in 2002.