Human rights defenders

I have in-depth knowledge of international development cooperation and M&E experience of more than 25 years, including through field exposure in fragile, war-affected and transition countries. I have worked in 30 countries outside Europe, for and as part of UN coordination bodies and UN agencies (for some 7 years). As team leader or senior expert, I completed with success more than 20 evaluations and 2 meta evaluations. 19 EU-related M&E tasks, and a total of 101 publications / reports and 66 presentations and lectures, have resulted from UN, EU, bilateral and private sector contracts. My working languages are English, French and German. Demonstrated experience in the conceptualization and implementation of complex strategic and thematic evaluations relates; Focus : Democracy and Rule of Law; Education, learning and capacity-building; fundamental rights; human rights-based and gender-based approaches to programming; gender equality; employment and social protection; public administration reform; migration; crisis prevention, stabilization and post-conflict rehabilitation; civil society and local authorities. Interventions comprise projects, programmes, strategy and policy interventions on behalf of UN (FAO, UNDP, UNESCO, UNHCR, UNICEF, UNITAR, UNOCA, UNRWA, UNU-EHS and WHO) bilateral partners (German Federal Foreign Office/FFO, Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs/FDFA) as well as capacity building for 17 national and civil society actors.

I am a human rights practitioner with more than twenty years of experience in post conflict countries as well as in countries in the EU accession process.
My main areas of expertise are post conflict housing, land and property rights, displaced persons, refugees and migrants’ rights, rule of law, legal aid, transitional justice. I have gathered also a significant experience in monitoring and supervising elections both at the field and central level. 
Thanks to these experiences, I developed a series of skills like human rights monitoring and reporting, providing expert advice to governmental bodies, drafting legal documents, advocacy with national authorities, designing projects and tools  for the purpose of protecting human rights.
I have worked extensively in the Western Balkans, mainly in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia and  Kosovo and for shorter period of times in Georgia, Ukraine, Rwanda, Jordan and Colombia. Besides these countries, I have recently worked in the United Kingdom as Deputy Director at Europe Regional Office of Amnesty International. 

I worked for international organisations, international NGOs, as well as private companies.  The roles that I covered were characterized by an increasing level of responsibilities and complexity. For these reasons, I moved from human rights officer to legal advisor, to team leader and in my latest assignment I was deputy director for Europe for Amnesty International. During these years I was also happy to work as a free-lance consultant and whenever possible offer my pro bono support to NGOs and other civil society organisations.  

In my work, but also in my life, I am committed to a continuous personal growth, seeking new challenges I am always eager to expand my knowledge and learn new things. For these reasons, I value direct experience, gathered at the field level, which delivers in depth knowledge of the current situation. Experience needs to be combined with the application of existing standards and principles. At the same time humor, kindness, tolerance and a good amount of social skills are also a key features of my professional approach and of my personality.

I have twenty plus (20+) years of experience in development, gender and humanitarian contexts. I am a gender, diversity and protection specialist. I hold a master’s degree in Human Rights, in Public Health, and in Conflict Resolution and Peacekeeping. My areas of expertise include M&E in humanitarian settings, capacity building and policy-oriented research on gender, protection and diversity.. I have worked for the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, for several Civil Society Organizations, such as Save the Children, for universities, for UN agencies, such as UNICEF and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, for UN Women, for WHO, for UNFPA, for bilateral agencies (Expertise France, AECID, GIZ, SIDA), for the European Commission (both, DG ECHO and DG INTPA) and for think tanks. Flexible and patiente. I am a team worker, but I am also used to work with autonomy. I love multicultural enviroments and I am highly committed to my job!

I am an Italian lawyer focusing on human rights advocacy and litigation.

We are advising German NGOs, Foundations and Local Authorities on DEVCO-Funding Instruments and -Procedures