Professor Verene A. Shepherd re-elected as Chair of UN CERD

Media Release – The Centre for Reparation Research (CRR) at The University of the West Indies is pleased to announce the reappointment of its Director, Professor Verene A. Shepherd, to the position of Chair of the United Nations’ Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD). CERD is the United Nation’s oldest Treaty Body, and the Committee implements the International Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.

Professor Shepherd, whose candidacy was supported by CARICOM, is the first citizen from the region as well as the first Jamaican to be a member of CERD and to serve as Chair. She has been a member of the Committee since 2016, winning the highest number of votes among those who competed for a seat on the CERD twice in a row. This is the third time that the Social Historian and Reparations Advocate will serve as Chair of the committee, having held four-year terms in 2015 and 2019 respectively.

She brings her expertise in Administration, History, Gender Studies, Migration Studies, Reparation and Human Rights to the position. She also brings to the CERD, her experience as a member of the United Nation’s Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent (WGEPAD) from 2010-to 2015, then served as Chair from 2012-to 2014, during which time she helped to draft the Programme of Activities for the UN’s International Decade for People of African Descent from 2015-2024.

Professor Shepherd assumed her post as Chair of the CERD on April 11, 2022, for two years.