Panel of Judges
Selected by the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal
to Hear this Session

Alberto Acosta Espinosa (Ecuador)

Ecuadorian economist and the country’s former Minister of energy and mining. He was the driving force behind the ground-breaking Yasuní-ITT Initiative, an offer by Ecuador to fight climate change by forgoing oil exploration and production in a large tract of untouched rainforest. Acosta is also the ex-president of the Constituent Assembly responsible for drawing up the now famous Montecristi Constitution, which took effect in 2008 and established protection for the rights of nature. Acosta ran unsuccessfully against Rafael Correa for president in 2013—one of eight presidential candidates. He is currently a researcher at FLASCO-Ecuador (Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences) and member of the advisory council of the International Rights of Nature Tribunal.

Lilia América Albert Palacios (Mexico)

Mexican scientist, she has distinguished herself for her concern regarding the degradation and environmental contamination of her country. Albert is the founder of the Mexican Society of Toxicology, twice vice president of Alatox, and a consultant of the World Health Organization (WHO). She was the first Mexican scientist to carry out studies on the possible effects of pesticide residues. Thanks to the preparation of his article, “Persistent Pesticides in Mexico”, the United States and Canada were induced to stop using DDT. She is author of numerous studies and books, among which include Pesticides, health and environments, Dictionary of Pollution and México tóxico.

Andrés Barreda (Mexico)

He is professor of the Faculty of Economics of UNAM, Mexico. He coordinates the Center for Social Analysis, Information and Popular Training (Casifop A.C.). He is founding member of the National Assembly of Environmental Affected and of the Union of Scientists Committed to Society (UCCS). He participated in the organizing nucleus and the guarantors committee of the Mexico Chapter of the Permanent Tribunal of the Peoples (2010-2014). Member of Oil Watch and is part of the advisory bureau of the National Support Center for Indigenous Missions and the ETC Group.

Upendra Baxi (India)

He is a legal scholar and a Professor of Law in Development at the University of Warwick, United Kingdom. He has been the Vice Chancellor of the University of Delhi (1990–1994), prior to which he held the position of Professor of Law at the same University for 23 years (1973–1996). He also served as the Vice Chancellor of the University of South Gujarat, Surat, India (1982–1985). Professor Baxi’s current areas of teaching and research include comparative constitutionalism, social theory of human rights, human rights responsibilities in corporate governance and business conduct, materiality of globalization, climate change justice and environmental justice. He is member of the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal.

Gill H. Boehringer (Australia)

Former Head of Law School, Macquarie University, Sydney Australia, he has also taught and researched in universities of the USA, Northern Ireland, England, Tanzania. He has taught many subjects in law as well as sociology of education, sociology of deviance, anthropology, criminology. Has served as a panel member on Permanent People’s Tribunals in Cambodia, Indonesia and Sri Lanka inquiring into the garment industry, in Mexico inquiring into globalization and the social crisis, and Kuala Lumpur on the Rohingya genocide. Current research includes corporate crime and regulatory capture in the Philippines; the “war on drugs” in the Philippines; world wide attacks on lawyers; alternative justice systems (Kurdistan; Brazil); people’s lawyers and people’s struggles (Turkey and the Philippines); local people’s tribunals and social movements. He has also served as an International Election Observer in the Philippines in 2007, 2010 and 2013.

Maria Fernanda Campa (Mexico)

Mexican geologist, she was the only woman in that speciality and the first to graduate in geological engineering.  Recentrly graduated went to work in Petróleo Mexicanos (PEMEX). She was part of the Mexican Petroleum Institute and founded the reservoir geology laboratory. Member of the group of engineers Constitution of 17, she and other colleagues defend the public and inalienable nature of the subsoil and a reform of the company away from the liberal scheme. 

Louis Kotzé (South Africa)

Research Professor of Law at the Faculty of Law, North-West University (Potchefstroom Campus), South Africa where he also teaches in the post-graduate LLM programme in Environmental Law and Governance. He is serving a concurrent term as Visiting Professor of Environmental Law at the University of Lincoln, UK. His research focuses on the Anthropocene, environmental constitutionalism, human rights, and global environmental governance and he has published over 100 publications on these themes. His recent books include: Research Handbook on Human Rights and the Environment (with Anna Grear-Edward Elgar, 2015); Global Environmental Constitutionalism in the Anthropocene (Hart, 2016); Environmental Law and Governance for the Anthropocene (Hart, 2017). He is co-editor of the Journal of Human Rights and the Environment. In 2016 he obtained a second Phd at Tilburg University and he has recently been awarded the prestigious European Commission Horizon 2020 Marie Curie Fellowship to conduct research for two years in the UK and the Netherlands.

Larry Lohmann (UK)

Larry Lohmann is a scholar and activist who works with the Corner House, a research and solidarity NGO in the UK that supports democratic and community movements for environmental and social justice. He has contributed to numerous scholarly books as well as to journals on land and forest conflicts, globalization, Southeast Asian environmental movements, racism, commons, climate change and the discourses of development, population and economics. He is also a founding member of the Durban Group for Climate Justice.

Francesco Martone (Italy)

His areas of work and interest concern migrants, globalization, peace and disarmament, human rights and enviromental justice. He is currently the spokeperson for the Italian network In Difesa Di that works in support of Human Rights Defenders. As member of the Italian Senate for two terms (2001-2008) he sat in the Senate’s Foreign Affairs Committee and was secretary of the Senate’s Human Rights Committee.   From 1988 to 1995 he worked for Greenpeace international, and then Chair of Gteenpeace Italy for 3 years. He founded and coordinated the Reform the World Bank campaign (now Re:common) from 1995 to 2001, . He worked from 2008 to 2016 for   English Ngo Forest Peoples Programme on issues related to indigenous peoples’ rights and climate change and is currently a consultant for the Tebtebba Foundation. He is currently member of the Board of  Un ponte per.  He is member of the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal.

Antoni Pigrau Solé (Spain) 

Professor of Public International Law at the Universitat Rovira i Virgili, in Tarragona. He has been the director of the Centro de Estudios de Derecho Ambiental de Tarragona (CEDAT) since December 2007 and director of the Revista Catalana de Dret Ambiental since 2009. He is member of the Board of Governors of the International Catalan Institute for Peace (ICIP). His research extends on matters of human rights, international criminal law and environmental law. He is member of the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal.