Dr. Rekha Oleschak Pillai, Senior Research Fellow at the International Research and Consulting Centre was invited to participate as faculty of the 1^st CLEA-MILAT human rights & social justice summer school 2022 in New Delhi, jointly organised by the National Human Right Commission India New in association with Indian Law Institute (ILI), New Delhi, The Commonwealth Legal Education Association,  and Lloyd Law College, Greater Noida, and with academic support from Empowerment through Law of the Common People (ELCOP), Bangladesh. The 11-day residential programme had student participants from several countries in Asia and from the African Continent. The Summer School was dedicated to the topic of « Freedom of Speech and Expression ».

Rekha introduced the participants to the situation of freedom of speech in Europe, inter alia through case law of the European Court of Human Rights, the Swiss Federal Supreme Court and the German Constitutional Court.

The focus of Rekha’s teaching sessions was on creating awareness on current challenges to freedom of speech and expression with particular focus on Europe as well as to highlight the threats, especially to academic freedom.

Additionally, she contributed a paper and chaired a panel at the Conference on Sustainable Development held at the premises between 5-6 June 2022. Her paper focussed on current developments in climate change litigation and the issues arising in multiple legal areas, namely criminal law, torts as well as fundamental and human rights.