Fraser Fellow Advocates for Asylum-Seekers Around the World
Tala Alfoqaha is an undergraduate double-majoring in Mathematics and Global Studies with a minor in French. As one of our 2019 Fraser Fellows, Tala spent this past summer interning with The Advocates for Human Rights. We asked her to share a bit about the important work she carried out there and what she learned from this enlightening experience.
Tala Alfoqaha: From start to finish, my experience with The Advocates was truly a pleasure. As an International Justice intern, I was given a surprising amount of responsibility and freedom in the projects I had to complete. Much of the work involved researching country conditions and writing reports, yet the research often included conducting interviews with asylum-seekers to gather firsthand information. I also attended a handful of Continuing Legal Education trainings which introduced me to a variety of practices and fields related to human rights in the legal discipline. Ultimately, I was able to foster connections in a passionate community of emerging and established human rights advocates.
During my fellowship I worked on several projects: The Burundi Commission of Inquiry Report, in which my intern team and I interviewed Burundian asylum-seekers to create a report highlighting the abuses of their civil and political rights to submit to the UN's Commission of Inquiry on Burundi; The Turkey Death Penalty Report, which was a joint report between U of M student Grace Curtiss and myself that drew attention to the possibility of Turkey reinstating the death penalty; and finally, The Honduras Violence Against Women Report which documented the situation of gender-based violence in Honduras drawing on information from the case files of asylum seekers fleeing the country. That report can be viewed in its entirety here.
Ultimately, I think this experience gave me an understanding of what it means to be a human rights advocate working within NGOs to leverage substantive change internally and abroad. I knew little of the various UN mechanisms and bodies before I started my work with The Advocates. Now I understand the difference between treaty-based and charter-based bodies, and have learned how NGOs can use their voice within each process to draw attention to abuses and create change.
The Fraser Fellowships are named after Donald and Arvonne Fraser—two groundbreaking leaders in human rights both locally and abroad. Through the fellowships we are investing in the next generation of human rights leaders by providing undergraduate students the opportunity to work in top human rights organizations. We are excited to extend the legacy of Don and Arvonne Fraser through these fellowship opportunities.
