DEVELOPING AND DISSEMINATING EDUCATIONAL MATERIALS RELATED TO HUMAN RIGHTS The Department of International Law and Human Rights of the University for Peace, with the support of the Government of the Netherlands, has been working since October 2003 on an innovative human rights project, the Human Rights Educational Project (HREP). The aim of the project is to develop and disseminate educational materials related to human rights in response to the need pf individuals and organizations, particularly in developing countries, to obtain convenient access to up-to-date human rights instruments and academic materials. Professionals, practitioners, volunteers, educators and human rights defenders can all benefit from the availability of human rights instruments through the use of a manual and a CD-ROM. The Human Rights Reference Handbook provides a general overview of human rights; human rights annotated case-law and materials which compare cases from the three regional human rights systems and the United Nations Human Rights Committee; a compilation of human rights instruments that includes international human rights treaties and other documents; and a CD-ROM that contains materials that supplement the books. Together, the materials will constitute an 'educational kit' to be distributed to academics, university students and NGOs in developing countries. UPEACE uses four basic 'delivery systems' for its educational products related to peace and human rights: graduate courses at its campus in San José, Costa Rica; delivery of courses at other universities or campuses; dissemination of course materials, including books and publications such as readers; and distance education courses via the Internet. This project will support all four delivery systems. The key purpose of the project is to compile all relevant human rights instruments, together with a basic discussion of the major issues related to human rights and the competences required of different human rights bodies. The project constitutes a response on the part of UPEACE to the substantial deterioration over the past decade in access to library materials for students in resource poor states in the Third World. While rapid changes in human rights issues have necessitated constant replacement of books, the prices of books have soared anduniversity resources available to purchase those books have dwindled. Why facilitate access to human rights information? Human rights education and promotion are essential to strengthen human rights protection at both the civil and academic levels. Individuals will be protected to the extent that they know their rights and duties. It is hoped that, through the adoption of modern communications technologies, including the Internet and CD-ROMs, this project will contribute to the dissemination of knowledge about human rights law. of communication, including websites and other electronic data dissemination such as the use of CD-ROMs. By producing human rights materials and making them available worldwide, and most importantly in developing countries, UPEACE is building on the experience obtained in offering its full-time residential programme to extend education that promotes the rule of law. Highly-qualified experts are in charge of managing this programme at the University for Peace headquarters in San José, Costa Rica: Dr. Magdalena Sepúlveda, (msepulveda@upeace.org); Ms. Christine Chamoun, MA, Project Officer (cchamoun@upeace.org); and Ms. Gudrun Gudmundsdottir, MA, Project Officer (ggudmundsdottir@upeace.org). Dr. Magdalena Sepúlveda is a Chilean lawyer. She holds a PhD in International Law from the University of Utrecht; a Diploma in Comparative law from Universidad Católica de Chile andan LLM in International Human Rights Law from the University of Essex. She was a researcher at the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights and staff attorney at the Inter-American Court on Human Rights. She is the former Co-Director of the International Law and Human Rights Programme at UPEACE. Christine Chamoun and Gudrun Gudmundsdottir graduated with distinction from the UPEACE Human Rights Programme in 2003. Christine is Lebanese. She holds a Diplôme d'Administration et de Politiques Internationales from Pierre Mendes France University and a Bachelor's Degree in International Relations from the University of Kent. Gudrun is Icelandic. She pursued a Master of Science in Economics and Business Administration at the University of Iceland and Copenhagen Business School and obtained a Bachelor's Degree in Russian Studies and Business Administration from the University of Iceland. All the best Simon Stander editor@monitor.upeace.org