The overarching question imparting urgency to this exploration is: Can U.S.-Russian contention in cyberspace cause the two nuclear superpowers to stumble into war? In considering this question we were constantly reminded of recent comments by a prominent U.S. arms control expert: At least as dangerous as the risk of an actual cyberattack, he observed, is cyber operations’ “blurring of the line between peace and war.” Or, as Nye wrote, “in the cyber realm, the difference between a weapon and a non-weapon may come down to a single line of code, or simply the intent of a computer program’s user.”
Fateh Azzam, former Regional Representative for the Middle East of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. Mr. Azzam will discuss the human rights issues raised at the UPR of 10 Arab States and their acceptance and rejection of recommendations made by the Human Rights Council.
This event is co-sponsored by the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy.
About Fateh Azzam:
Fateh Azzam is a researcher, human rights consultant and Visiting Fellow at the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Relations at the American University in Beirut, and at Lund University College Research Centre. He was Regional Representative for the Middle East of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights From 2006 until June of 2012. Previously, he was Director of the Forced Migration and Refugee Studies Program at the American University in Cairo (2003-2006); Program Officer for Human Rights at the Ford Foundation’s Offices in Lagos and Cairo (1996-2003); and Director of the Palestinian human rights organization Al-Haq (1987-1995). He led the process of establishing the Arab Human Rights Fund (www.ahrfund.org) and serves as Chairman of its Board of Directors, and has served on the Boards of several Palestinian, Arab and international human rights organizations. Mr. Azzam holds an LLM in International Human Rights Law from the University of Essex, and has authored numerous articles and studies on human rights which appeared inHuman Rights Quarterly, Arab Journal for Human Rights,Riwaq ‘Arabi, Al-Mustaqbal, Nordic Journal of International Law, and Sur International Journal on Human Rights.