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Honorary and Adjunct Appointments

Honorary Professors

Professor Shashikala Gurpur: Honorary Professor

Professor Shashikala Gurpur

Professor Shashikala Gurpur is Dean of the Faculty of Law at Symbiosis International University and Director of Symbiosis Law School, Pune, one of India’s leading law schools. A Jean Monnet Chair Professor (2021–2024) and Fulbright Scholar, she has over 30 years’ experience in legal education, research, and policy, and has served as a member of the Law Commission of India.

She has led numerous international collaborations in areas including climate change law, gender justice, human rights, and legal technology, and has published extensively on international law, feminist jurisprudence, and law and social transformation. Professor Gurpur is a member of several national and international academic and policy bodies, including the Bar Council of India’s Curriculum Development Committee and the Academic Council of India’s National Judicial Academy, and is widely recognised for her leadership in advancing innovative and inclusive legal education.

Adjunct Professors

Colonel Richard Brennan BL: Adjunct Professor

Colonel Richard Brennan BL is Director of the Defence Forces Legal Service at Defence Forces Headquarters and a barrister with over 35 years’ service in the Irish Defence Forces. He has extensive international operational experience, having served on UN missions in Lebanon, Syria, Eritrea, and Kosovo, and as Senior Legal Advisor with Irish contingents to UNIFIL and UNDOF.

A specialist in international humanitarian law, human rights law, and peace operations, he has served as Ireland’s representative on international expert groups on lethal autonomous weapons, explosive weapons in populated areas, and civilian harm mitigation. He lectures widely in Ireland and abroad, including at the International Institute of Humanitarian Law (San Remo), NATO Partnership for Peace Centre (Ankara), and the Irish Centre for Human Rights, and sits on the Board of Directors of the International Society for Military Law and the Law of War.

Ms. Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh KC: Adjunct Professor

Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh

Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh KC is a leading barrister at Matrix Chambers, London, specialising in public international law, international criminal law, human rights, and protest law. Called to the Bars of England & Wales, Ireland, and Northern Ireland, she has acted before the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court, and in landmark domestic and international cases, including representing South Africa in its genocide proceedings against Israel at the ICJ.

Renowned as a “fiercely intelligent” and “tactically brilliant” advocate, she has been named International Law Junior of the Year (Legal 500 Bar Awards) and serves on the ICC’s List of Counsel. Blinne is also a former Visiting Fellow at Harvard Law School and Vice-Chair of the Bar Human Rights Committee, and is widely recognised as one of the foremost human rights and public international lawyers of her generation.

Judge Beti Hohler: Adjunct Professor

Judge Beti Hohler is a Judge of the International Criminal Court (ICC), having commenced her judicial term in 2024. She is an international criminal lawyer with extensive experience across judicial, prosecutorial and advisory roles in international and hybrid justice settings.

Prior to her judicial appointment, Judge Hohler served for almost a decade as a Trial Lawyer with the Office of the Prosecutor at the ICC, including as a lead member of prosecution teams in complex international criminal cases. Earlier in her career, she worked with the EU Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo, advising international judges at appellate and supreme court level, and practiced law within the Slovenian judiciary. She is also a founding member and Director of Training at the Institute for International Legal and Advocacy Training, delivering specialist advocacy training in international criminal law.

Judge Hohler has contributed regularly to the work of the Irish Centre for Human Rights through guest lectures and participation in the International Criminal Court Summer School, bringing invaluable practitioner insight to teaching and research in international criminal law.

Ms. Dagmar Hovestadt: Adjunct Professor

Dagmar Hovestadt

Dagmar Hovestadt is an internationally recognised expert on archives, human rights, and transitional justice, with over two decades of experience in journalism, strategic communications, and archival research. Formerly Head of Outreach and Research at the Stasi Records Archive in Berlin, she led major initiatives on public engagement, international collaboration, and the role of archives in addressing past human rights abuses.

She has served as an international expert for the OSCE on fact-finding, access to secret police archives, and judicial communication strategies, and she contributes widely as an author, speaker, moderator, and board member in the fields of public-interest journalism and cultural heritage. Her publications on archives and transitional justice are widely cited, and she is a Fellow of the BMW Foundation Responsible Leadership Network and the Global Diplomacy Lab.

Professor Dr. Guénaël Mettraux: Adjunct Professor

Professor Dr. Guénaël Mettraux

Professor Dr. Guénaël Mettraux is a Judge at the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague and one of the world’s leading experts in international criminal law. He has previously served as defence counsel before the International Criminal Court, the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, and the Special Court for Sierra Leone, and as Senior Consultant to the United Nations on accountability for ISIS crimes.

A prolific scholar, he is the author of The Law of Command Responsibility (OUP) and the multi-volume International Crimes – The Law and the Practice (OUP), and serves on the editorial boards of the Journal of International Criminal Justice and the International Criminal Law Review. He is an Adjunct Professor at the Irish Centre for Human Rights, University of Galway, and has held academic positions at the Universities of Amsterdam, Leiden, Geneva, and Fribourg, among others.

Judge Oscar Parra Vera: Adjunct Professor

Judge Oscar Parra Vera is a Magistrate of Colombia’s Special Jurisdiction for Peace, serving in the Chamber for the Acknowledgement of Truth, Responsibility and Determination of Facts and Conduct. He is also a Senior Research Fellow in the Programme for Studies on Human Rights in Context at Ghent University, Belgium.

Judge Parra Vera holds a Master’s degree in Criminology and Criminal Justice from the University of Oxford and a law degree and Master’s in legal theory from the National University of Colombia. He previously served as Coordinating Attorney at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and has worked with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the European Court of Human Rights, and multiple United Nations human rights mechanisms as an expert adviser.

His academic and professional expertise spans transitional justice, reparations, international human rights law, and judicial responses to mass atrocities, bringing significant comparative and practitioner insight to the teaching and research activities of the Irish Centre for Human Rights and the School of Law.