Irwin Cotler

(1940- )

Irwin Cotler is Member of Parliament for Mount Royal, where he was first elected in a by-election in November 1999 with 92% of the vote, in what was characterized as “the most stunning electoral victory in this century by any standard.” He was re-elected in the general election of November 2000 with the highest percentage in the country.

On December 12, 2003, the Prime Minister appointed him Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada. Minister Cotler currently serves as a member of the following Cabinet Committees: the Priorities and Planning; Domestic Affairs; Canada-U.S; Global Affairs; and the Aboriginal Affairs Cabinet Committee. He is also Vice-Chair of the Security, Public Health & Emergencies Cabinet Committee and an alternate on the Treasury Board Cabinet Committee.

Although an M.P. for only four years, he already made a distinctive mark as Chair of the Parliamentarians for Global Action (Canada), a body of 1500 democratically elected parliamentarians, and Member of its International Council; (2001-2003) Co-Chair of the Parliamentary Human Rights Group, the first ever all-party joint House-Senate human rights caucus; (2000-2003) Executive Member of the Inter-Parliamentary Union; Honorary Member of the Women’s Caucus; and Special Advisor to the Minister of Foreign Affairs on the International Criminal Court, where, inter alia, he shepherded the War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity Act through Parliament. He was a member of the House of Commons Standing Committees on Foreign Affairs and International Trade; Chair of the Foreign Affairs Sub-Committee on Human Rights and International Development; and a member of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. He is a leading public advocate in and out of Parliament for the Human Rights Agenda; and recently headed the Canadian Delegation to the Stockholm Internatioal Forum on the Prevention of Genocide.

MINISTER COTLER is currently on leave as a Professor of Law at McGill University, where he is Director of its Human Rights Programme, and Chair of InterAmicus, the McGill-based International Human Rights Advocacy Centre. He has been a Visiting Professor at Harvard Law School, a Woodrow Wilson Fellow at Yale Law School, and is the recipient of five Honourary Doctorates including one from York University, whose citation referred to him as “a scholar and advocate of international stature.”

One of the founders of the “Poverty Law” movement in Canada and the Pointe St-Charles Legal Aid Clinic some thirty years ago, he served as Special Advisor to former Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada John Turner in the areas of human rights, law reform, and the rights of the poor (from 1968-1972); was one of the founders of “Project Genesis” – a community service storefront office – in the Mount Royal riding; and one of the original architects of what has become a Quebec and nation-wide legal services programme.

An international human rights lawyer, he served as Counsel to former prisoners of conscience in the Soviet Union (Andrei Sakharov), South Africa (Nelson Mandela), Latin America (Jacobo Timmerman), and Asia (Muchtar Pakpahan). He recently served as international legal counsel to imprisoned Russian environmentalist Aleksandr Nikitin; Nigerian playwright and Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka; the Chilean-Canadian group Vérité et justice in the Pinochet case; Chinese-Canadian political prisoner, Professor KunLun Zhang; and, most recently, served as Counsel to Professor Saad Edin Ibrahim, the leading democracy advocate in the Arab world. In the words of his students on the occasion of his receiving an Honourary Doctorate, “A pioneer in the area of international human rights law and advocacy, Irwin Cotler’S legal briefs have emerged as models for the new 'genre' of advocacy…his initiatives have broken new ground in this area, and he has achieved international renown for his defence of political prisoners.” A feature article on him in Maclean’s magazine referred to him as, “Counsel for the Oppressed”.

A constitutional and comparative law scholar, he has litigated every section of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, including landmark cases in the areas of free speech, freedom of religion, women's rights, minority rights, war crimes justice, prisoners’ rights, and peace law. He has testified as an expert witness on human rights before Parliamentary Committees in Canada, the United States, Russia, Sweden, Norway, and Israel, and has lectured at major international academic and professional gatherings in America, Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.

A noted peace activist, he has been a leader in the movement for arms control, and helped develop “Peace Law” as an area of both academic inquiry and legal advocacy; as well, Irwin Cotler has been engaged – both as scholar and participant observer – in the search for peace in the Middle East. He has lectured in both Arab countries and Israel for over twenty years and has been an active participant in “rapprochement” dialogues between Israelis and Palestinians.

A leader in the struggle against impunity and the development of international humanitarian law, Irwin Cotler served as Counsel to the Deschênes Commission of Inquiry in the matter of bringing Nazi war criminals to justice; filed amicus briefs before the International Criminal Tribunals for former Yugoslavia and Rwanda; and testified before the Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs regarding humanitarian intervention and the application of humanitarian law in Kosovo.

A long-time advocate in the international struggle against racism and discrimination of any kind, Irwin Cotler has been at the forefront of the international struggle against apartheid, as well as in helping to develop legal remedies against racism in Canada and beyond. An advocate of the rights of visible minorities and Counsel to numerous national and international NGOs, he has served as Counsel to the National Coalition for Japanese-Canadian redress; Counsel to the Chinese-Canadian National Council; Counsel to the Coalition for Women’s Human Rights in Conflict Situations; Chair of the National Conference on Aboriginal Rights and the Canadian Justice System; and Co-Chair of the Canadian Helsinki Watch Group.

Irwin Cotler’S efforts have resulted in his chairing, or being a member of, a number of governmental and citizens' Commissions of Inquiry - including being Chair of the International Commission of Inquiry into the Fate and Whereabouts of Raoul Wallenberg; Chair of the Commission on Economic Coercion and Discrimination; member of the Commission of Inquiry on the Crime of Apartheid; Counsel before the Commission of Inquiry into the Bringing of Nazi War Criminals to Justice; and member of the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal.

Irwin Cotler was appointed in 1992 as an Officer of the Order of Canada, where he was cited for his ‘extraordinary contribution to the cause of human rights”. He is the only Canadian elected to the Paris-based Académie universelle des cultures (1993), and the first recipient of the Justice Walter Tarnopolsky Memorial Medal awarded jointly by the Canadian Bar Association, the Canadian Judges Association, the Canadian Association of Law Teachers, and the International Commission of Jurists (1994). In September 1999, Irwin Cotler became the first academic ever to receive The Medal of the Bar of Montreal in recognition of his “outstanding contribution to the cause of justice”; more recently, became the first recipient of the Martin Luther King Jr. Humanitarian Award.