Sarah Kerremans is a PhD researcher at the Human Rights Centre of Ghent University since November 2021. She empirically explores the case of half a century of human rights violations, accountability and oil violence in Peru’s historical oil circuit and indigenous resistance in this part of the Amazon. Her research forms part of the broader inter-institutional research project ‘Future-Proofing Human Rights: developing thicker forms of accountability´.
Sarah Kerremans can build upon an extensive lived experience regarding human rights in practice: after having worked as a legal advisor for asylum seekers and migrants in Belgium, she engaged for over a decade with grassroots environmental organizations and indigenous communities in the Peruvian Amazon. She then worked at the Belgian Embassy in Lima where she was involved in the follow up and monitoring of development cooperation themes and human rights crises in Peru, Ecuador, and Bolivia.
She has a strong interest in indigenous perspectives, extractivism and ecoterritorial conflict, intercultural justice and translation in a permanent dialogue with the Global South´s knowledges.
Education
University Degrees
- Master European Law (DES), Institut d’études européennes, ULB, Belgium, 2005.
- Law Degree (Licenciaat), KU Leuven, Belgium, 2004.
Additional (inter)national (human rights) courses taken
- Specialization in intercultural justice – Diploma for judges and prosecutors – Legal Court of Loreto- UCP- Legal Defense Institute (IDL), Peru, 2013
- Summer school European Asylum and Migration Law, Odysseus Network, ULB, Belgium, 2008
Professional positions
- Doctoral researcher Ghent University (2021-ongoing)
- Responsible for Development Cooperation in Peru, Bolivia, and Ecuador, Belgian Embassy in Lima, Peru (2018)
- Executive Director and indigenous rights specialist, Chaikuni Institute, Peruvian Amazon (2015)
- Human rights, environmental justice, and intercultural education Project Coordinator (Putumayo vzw, Alianza Arkana), Peruvian Amazon (2009)
- Legal advisor, asylum and migration law, de8-Antwerps Minderhedencentrum (Currently: Atlas)(2005)
Featured publications
