Monika Kalra Varma

Monika Kalra Varma "is the Director of Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights (RFK Center). Ms. Varma develops and oversees the RFK Center's programs, its day-to-day operations and long-term strategies.

"A member of the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights (CHR) team since 2002, Ms. Varma previously served as Program Director and a Legal and Program Officer of the Center. In these capacities she has spearheaded the Center's extensive and innovative economic and social rights advocacy, including efforts to hold international actors accountable for extra-territorial economic rights violations, conducted advocacy campaigns targeting the United Nations, U.S. government, OAS Member States, International Financial Institutions, and regional bodies, and directed RFK Center's domestic and regional legal actions. In addition, Ms. Varma has provided direct programmatic support for the RFK Center's programs in Haiti, India, and New Orleans.

"Ms. Varma currently serves on the Editorial Board of the Harvard-based Francois-Xavier Bagnoud Health and Human Rights Journal. She is also a member of the Advisory Board for the Global India Fund.

"Prior to joining the RFK Center, Ms. Varma worked for the UN International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in Hague, Netherlands as a legal officer with the Office of the Prosecutor. She was a member of the trial team which secured the Tribunal's first indictment and eventual conviction of the crime of terror against General Stanislav Galic, the Serb military commander in Sarajevo from 1992-1994. Ms. Varma also served as a law clerk at the UN International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

"Ms. Varma received her Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of California, San Diego. She attained a Juris Doctorate degree from the University of California at Davis School of Law."