Professor Verene A. Shepherd, University Director of the Institute for Gender and Development Studies at The University of the West Indies (UWI) is the newly appointed Chairperson of the United Nations Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent (WGPAD). 
 
The announcement of her appointment came at the recently concluded 11th Annual Meeting of the Working Group in Geneva, Switzerland. 
 
The Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent operates within the United Nations system and is tasked with strengthening the promotion and protection of human rights around the globe, as well as addressing situations of human rights violations and make recommendations on them. The WGPAD is specifically mandated to examine the problems of racial discrimination faced by people of African descent, to collaborate with respective countries to devise policies aimed at eradicating racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and intolerance; as well as to propose measures to ensure access to justice for all persons of African Descent. 
 
It was established by the United Nations Commission on Human Rights resolution 2002/68 of 25 April 2002 in direct response to the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, held in Durban in 2001 and the subsequent Durban Declaration and Programme of Action, which both advocated for consideration to be given to “establishing a working group or other mechanism of the United Nations to study the problems of racial discrimination faced by people of African descent living in the African Diaspora and make proposals for the elimination of racial discrimination against people of African descent". 
 
Originally named a mandate holder to the WGPAD in 2010, in her current capacity as Chairperson, Professor Shepherd will now assume stewardship of the Group in its obligation to realize the principles of equality and non-discrimination and address all the issues concerning the well-being of Africans and people of African descent contained in the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action. 
 
In accepting the position, Professor Shepherd urged the international community to envision and craft new futures, moving towards the end of all expressions of intolerance.