2006 Presenter Full Presenter List

Irwin Cotler

Former Minister of Justice

Irwin Cotler, Member of Parliament for Mount Royal and former Minister of Justice and Attorney General (until the General Election of January 2006), helped transform the face of the judiciary through the appointment of two outstanding women justices to the Supreme Court of Canada. He also initiated legislation for the Protection of Children and other Vulnerable Persons, the first ever legislation to criminalize trafficking in persons; made the pursuit of international justice a priority; and quashed more wrongful convictions in a single year than any prior Minister.

Cotler is currently on leave as a Professor of Law at McGill University, where he is Director of its Human Rights Programme, and Chair of InterAmicus, the McGill-based International Human Rights Advocacy Centre. He has been a Visiting Professor at Harvard Law School, a Woodrow Wilson Fellow at Yale Law School, and is the recipient of seven Honourary Doctorates, including one from York University, whose citation referred to him as “as scholar and advocate of international stature”.

Irwin Cotler was appointed in 1992 as an Officer of the Order of Canada, where he was cited for his “extraordinary contribution to the cause of human rights.” More recently, he became the first recipient of the Martin Luther King Jr. Humanitarian Award.