Carol Corillon
Former Executive Director of the IHRN
From its founding in 1993 until her retirement in 2016, Carol Corillon served as executive director of the International Human Rights Network of Academies and Scholarly Societies (IHRN) and helped to build a network of more than 90 participating academies to support fellow scientists and scholars suffering human rights abuses around the world.
During her tenure with the IHRN, Ms. Corillon was also the director of the Committee on Human Rights (CHR) of the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, which serves as the secretariat of the IHRN, and the executive director of Friends of the Israeli-Palestinian Science Organization, USA.
Upon her retirement, Ms. Corillon was asked to serve as an honorary member of the IHRN Executive Committee and was gifted a collection of letters from scholars and scientific colleagues around the world to celebrate more than 30 years of her dedicated leadership. Below are excerpts from a few select letters among dozens lauding her commitment to human rights and efforts to obtain justice for scientists, engineers, and health professionals under threat as a result of their legitimate professional work or other peaceful activities.
“Your integrity, professionalism and compassion have made the Network go a long way. You have ensured that our work is based on solid information and knowledge; that our reports rely on solid research and are trustworthy, and that the Network’s ‘Action Alerts’ can be argued for and are important. For these reasons the Network has established a name for itself and become respected for its integrity and work.”
-- Ida Nicolaisen, Senior Research Fellow in Culutral Anthropology, Nordik Institute of Asian Studies, Copenhagen University; Member, Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters; Executive Committee Member, IHRN
“…it is amazing how much you have done to elevate the consideration of human rights issues among leading scientists and scientific organizations across the globe. Your unique contributions have accomplished much more than is obvious from the many individual lives rescued. You have broadened the horizons of scientists, engineers, and medical professionals everywhere by leading us to take responsibility for the fate of our colleagues. Through such efforts, you have made a major contribution to strengthening the international scientific community’s efforts to spread science and scientific thinking to all of humanity.”
-- Bruce Alberts, Chancellor’s Leadership Chair in Biochemistry and Biophysics for Science and Education, Emeritus at the University of California, San Francisco; and President Emeritus of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.
“…there are so many places in the world where scientists are persecuted, tortured and imprisoned. It is duty for us to devote part of our time for trying to help them. Your role in initiating and coordinating these actions has been absolutely essential. Without you, nothing could have been done. You are the soul, the leading spirit of our network.”
-- Claude Cohen-Tannoudji, Professor of Physics, Ecole Normale Superieure, Paris
“The IHRN has been blessed with your inspiration and leadership as the Executive Director for many years, decades. Carol, during all those years you have managed to inspire many of us to become involved in the defense of scientists throughout the world, whose human rights as professionals have been trampled. In addition, you provided us with a constant supply of information about the situation of many scientists detained and imprisoned, which the IHRN has been defending, with clear instructions for action to the member Academies. Your personal data bank, not digital but cerebral, has been essential to the continued success of the IHRN.”
-- Pedro León, Professor of Biology University of Costa Rica (Retired); Foreign Associate, U.S. National Academy of Science
“Some of these letters express well the spirit of this committee – how it has been able to channel the humanitarian concerns of scientists by capitalizing on their international connections and their belief in the importance of freedom of expression. They also show that this has been largely because of your amazing ability to make the right connections and get us organized in effective ways.”
-- Mary Jane West-Eberhard, Senior Scientist Emerita, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Costa Rica; Vice Chair, Committee on Human Rights, U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
“It will be hard to imagine this Committee without you at the helm…[I] have always come way with amazement and admiration at the wide range of complex issues that you deal with in the most efficient and sensitive manner imaginable.”
-- Raghavendra Gadagkar, NSA SN Bose Research Professor and JC Bose National Fellow, Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore; President, Indian National Science Academy, New Delhi