THE former international jurist, Mr Niall MacDermot, who was born in Dublin, has died at the age of 79. For 20 years he was Secretary General of the International Committee of Jurists (ICJ) and was a former British Labour government minister. The ICJ announced his death yesterday.
The ICJ, which links senior jurists around the globe in campaigning for the rule of law and defence of human rights, said Mr MacDermot died last Thursday in Geneva where he had settled after retiring in 1990.
"He was the mentor and protector of human rights activists the world over," said Adama Dieng, a Senegalese lawyer who took over from him at the Geneva based ICJ in 1990.
"At dire times, when most were silent, Niall MacDermot stood up to dictators to defend the rights and lives of the oppressed," the ICJ said in a statement.
He was born in 1916, studied law at Oxford University and served as a lieutenant colonel in the British army in the second World War, winning an OBE for his part in the D Day landings.
After the war, he practised law in London as a barrister and twice served as a Labour MP - from 1957-59 and from 1962-70.
He joined the newly elected Labour government of Harold Wilson in 1964 as Financial Secretary to the Treasury and served as Minister of State for Planning and Land from 1967-68.
The ICJ said, because of his legal skills, he was a prime force behind the drafting of many international human rights covenants, including accords aimed at preventing torture and arbitrary detention.