The Faculty of the Diploma Course in International Environmental Law is composed of renowned university professors teaching at institutions worldwide. They provide a substantial intellectual contribution to UNITAR, supporting the implementation of the environmental law course. A short biography of the faculty members currently attached to the Diploma Course in Environmental Law is provided below.

Professor Don ANTON

Professor Anton has been practising and teaching International Law and Environmental Law since 1988. Since 2000, he has been a member of the Faculty of The Australian National University (ANU) College of Law, where he has teaches International Environmental Law, International Law, Marine and Coastal Law, International Climate Law, and Environmental Law. At the ANU, he served as Acting-Director of the Australian Centre for Environmental Law and Covenor of all Undergraduate and Postgraduate Environmental Law Programs from June 2000 until June 2003. He is currently Assistant Sub-Dean for Students (Careers). In 2003, he was Visiting Professor of International Environmental Law at the University of Michigan Law School. In 2007 he served as a Visiting Professor at the University of Alabama School of Law, teaching Human Rights and the Environment. He has also lectured in International Environmental Law and Trade and the Environment in the LL.M. programs at the University of Sydney and the University of Adelaide, and has been a Course Instructor for the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). He served as a Lecturer in Environmental Law and International Law at the University of Melbourne from 1994-1997. In 1992-1993 Don was employed as a Research associate in International Law at Columbia University in New York working with Lou Henkin and Oscar Schachter. Anton serves on the Executive Council of the Australian and New Zealand Society of International Law and is a Corresponding Editor for International Legal Materials, published by the American Society of International Law. His books include: International Environmental Law: Cases, Materials & Problems (LexisNexis Matthew Bender, 2007)(with Jonathan I. Charney, Philippe Sands, Thomas J. Schoenbaum & Michael K. Young); International Law: Cases and Materials (Oxford Univ. Press, 2005)(with Penelope Mathew and Wayne Morgan)International Law: Politics, Values and Functions (Martinus Nijhoff 1998)(with Jon Charney and Mary Ellen O’Connell), and A Question of Justice Challenge: Global Environmental Protection (Magraw-Hill 1996).

Professor Marcelo DIAS VARELLA

Dr. Varella obtained a PhD in Law at the "Université de Paris I, Panthéon-Sorbonne". In recent years, has worked as an advisor to several international organizations and has written more than ten manuals on International Law, Environmental Law and Economic Law as well as an assortment of articles in these fields. In addition, Dr. Dias Varella has been invited to present work at conferences hosted by European and Latin American institutions. Currently, he is a Professor and Programme Coordinator at the Postgraduate Programme of the “Centro Universitário de Brasília”. Alongside this work, Dr. Dias Varella has an advisory role at the National Counsel for Scientific and Technological Research as well as the Brazilian Presidential Office.

Professor Agnès MICHELOT

Dr Agnès Michelot is Maître de conférences at the University of La Rochelle where she teaches Public International Law, Comparative Law, International Environmental Law, European Law and International Trade Law. She is the director of the Center of Francophone Legal Studies (Centre d’Etudes Juridiques Francophones). Dr Michelot is currently a Special Fellow at the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR).

She is also a consultant for UNESCO’s Man and Biosphere Programme and is implicated in European projects as international consultant in environmental law. She has field experience in Africa (South and Western Africa), Asia (China, India) and Latin America (Argentina, Bolivia, Costa Rica). She is member of the Scientific Council of the Vosges du Nord Biosphere Reserve (France).

Professor Manuel PULGAR-VIDAL

Prof. Manuel Pulgar–Vidal is a lawyer by trade and the Executive Director of the Peruvian Society for Environmental Law (Sociedad Peruana de Derecho Ambiental). He is a renowned specialist in environmental law and policy with special emphasis on issues related to environmental public management. Mr. Pulgar-Vidal is frequently hired as a consultant on a wide range of environmental law and policy topics, both in Peru as well as in other Latin American countries.

In other capacities, he currently chairs the Interamerican Association for the Defense of the Environment — an organization incorporated in the State of California – and is also a professor at the Universidad Peruana de Ciencias Aplicadas. In this role, Mr. Pulgar–Vidal is in charge of the Environmental Law and Natural Resources Course. At the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, he is responsible both of the Theory of Natural Resources Course in within the Environmental Law Diploma Post-Graduate Programme and the General Environmental Law Course given by the Law School.

Professor Dinah SHELTON

Professor Dinah Shelton is the Patricia Roberts Harris Research Professor of Law at the George Washington University Law School, where she joined the Faculty in 2004 after teaching at the law schools of the University of Notre Dame and University of Santa Clara. She has also lectured at Stanford Law School, the University of California Boalt School of Law, and the University Robert Schuman (France).

In addition to her teaching, Professor Shelton has been a practicing lawyer, an associate of the International Institute of Human Rights, and director of the office of staff attorneys for the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. She serves on the executive councils of several international human rights and environmental associations and is a consultant to many international and regional inter-governmental organizations. Professor Shelton has written several prize-winning books and is co-author with Professor Kiss of International Environmental Law (3rd edition, 2004). Her numerous articles address topics in international law, human rights law and international environmental law. She is a contributing editor to the Yearbook of International Environmental Law and is a member of the Board of Editors of the American Journal of International Law.