Expertise in: Human Rights 

Melissa Upreti is an internationally recognized human rights lawyer and legal expert who has spent over two decades advancing women’s rights and gender equality globally, and with a strong focus on Asia. She has held key leadership and management positions at the International Commission of Jurists, the Center for Women’s Global Leadership and at the Center for Reproductive Rights.  

Upreti is a former UN Special Procedures Mandate-Holder and served two terms as an Expert Member of the Human Rights Council’s UN Working Group on discrimination against women and girls, from 2017-2023, including as Chair-Rapporteur from 2021-2022. She is a Fellow at the University of Toronto, Law Faculty’s International Reproductive and Sexual Health Law Program.