Executive Director, Minority Rights Group International

Joshua Castellino took on the role of Executive Director at MRG in October 2018 and brings a wealth of legal knowledge around minority rights, access to justice and the interplay between security, development and human rights. He regularly engages with multilateral organizations, Law Societies and NGOs in Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Latin America, on issues of human rights advocacy and public international law.

Joshua stepped down as Dean of the School of Law at Middlesex University which he founded in 2012, but retains his Chair in Law at the University, continuing to teach and supervise students working on indigenous peoples and minority rights issues.

His unorthodox route to this work commenced as a journalist in Mumbai, with the Indian Express Group, Mumbai. India. He was awarded a Chevening Scholarship to pursue an MA in International Law & Politics (1995) and completed his PhD in International Law (1998) while working as a Graduate Teaching Assistant on Law Programmes at Hull University, UK. He has authored and edited eight books in international law and human rights law, on self-determination, title to territory and indigenous peoples’ rights, besides hundreds of other outputs on a range of these and other legal sub-topics.

Joshua was part of the EU-China Experts & Diplomatic Dialogue and Lawyers for the New Millennium: Support for the Arab Law Union. He serves on the Leadership Council of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network where he co-chaired the Thematic Group on Social Inclusion, Gender and Human Rights. He was appointed Chair, by the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights of the 8th Forum on Minority Issues (2015), an inter-governmental dialogue with civil society under the auspices of the United Nations Human Rights Council. He was appointed Door Tenant at 25 Bedford Row, London, in June 2017.

In addition to his full-time role at MRG, Joshua continues to work in other settings. He is Visiting Professor at Oxford University, UK, and at the College of Europe, Poland and holds an honorary Professorship at National University of Ireland, Galway. He also plays a role on Governing /Advisory Boards of Privacy International, (London), the Institute for Statelessness and Inclusion, (Tilburg), The Institute of the Global South, (New Delhi), the European Human Rights Advocacy Centre, (London), the European Centre for Constitutional & Human Rights, (Berlin) and the Tom Lantos Institute, (Budapest). He currently sits on the World Economic Forum’s Global Futures Council on Social Cohesion.