Lawyer, human rights activist and prize-winning author Peter Harris has received an honorary doctorate from the University of Warwick to add to his Warwick LLM.

In the early 1980s, newly graduated from Rhodes University, Peter took a role at South Africa’s Legal Resources Centre, a campaigning organisation set up to improve access to justice for disadvantaged South Africans. He continued to specialise in human rights issues and became involved in the fight against apartheid, often acting for the defence in political trials. His first book, In a Different Time, tells the story of one of these trials – the Delmas Four, whom Peter represented.

Staff, LLM students and Warwick alumni came together last month to discuss career opportunities and the realities of life after graduation. The Alumni/LLM Employability and Networking reception took place down at our Warwick in London offices near Kings Cross, and offered current students the opportunity to learn from the experiences of our law alumni and seek advice about their futures.

Warwick Law School alumnus Wong Chen has won a landslide victory in Malaysia’s historic general election earlier this month. The elections saw the ending of the rule by the Barisan Nasional (BN or National Front) coalition which had been in power since the country’s independence from Britain in 1957.

Former Warwick LLM student, Varun Lamba has been promoted to Partner at his Law firm in India. Following completion of his LLM in International Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation here at Warwick in 2009, Varun went on to join AZB & Partners as an Associate. He was later promoted to Senior Associate in 2015 and is now a Partner.

We love to hear from our alumni and what they are up to. We caught up with Varun to find out a little more.

After the Rwandan genocide saw the murder of up to one million people, prosecutor Charles Adeogun-Phillips was tasked with delivering justice to the victims. In an article by Lacuna Magazine, he talks to Warwick Law School's Sanjeeb Hossain about his 12 years leading genocide prosecutions at the UN International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, how he coped with the crimes he tried and what he learnt about humanity.

Charles Adeogun-Phillips (Warwick Law Alumnus, 1986) visited the Law School last month for the first time in over 30 years, to give a seminar to our students.

Charles, who founded Charles Anthony LLP, gave a talk in the Law School student hub on Friday 26 January to a mix of undergraduate students, postgraduate students and staff. He spoke about his experience at Warwick, remembering the department fondly, telling students “there was always something unique about the law here - getting to study the various subjects from a very contextual and contemporary point of view.”

Professor Ann Stewart, with the assistance of Dr Jennifer Lander, has been asked by Help Age International (a leading non-governmental organisation campaigning for and with, older people worldwide) to produce a briefing document for them on gender and ageing. Happily, people across the globe are now able to enjoy fulfilling lives for longer but many older people are not well treated. The briefing document will be used to highlight how gender issues affect many aspects of ageing.

One of our students who completed the BA and MA in English Literature appears on The Verb to discuss her Edinburgh show, Elsa. The show was inspired by her MA module, 'Poetry and Music', and dissertation on song. Listen from about 17.00 for Isobel.

Former Warwick LLM student, Anna Celuch, who recently graduated with a distinction will soon be packing her bags to help local African entrepreneurs build successful businesses.

Anna travelled from Poland to study International Economic Law at Warwick University, and went on to be awarded Top Postgraduate Performer in IEL 2016/17. 

While studying a module on Human Rights in Practice, four Warwick Law students embarked on a human rights project which led to an incredibly successful petition- gaining nearly 60,000 signatures.

In an article published in Lacuna, Warwick Law student, Helen Bates describes how her team began researching into sexism in the workplace to discover the scale and seriousness of pregnancy and maternity discrimination. Joining forces with Joeli Brearley, the founder of ‘Pregnant then Screwed’, they set up a petition that would extend pregnant mother’s legal rights to bring a discrimination claim to tribunal from 3 months to 6 months.