Jeri Laber, '49
A Founder of
Human Rights Watch
Jeri Laber was born and educated in New York City. She graduated from Jamaica High School in January 1949 (as Lola Lidsky) and from New York University in 1952. She did her graduate work at Columbia University’s Harriman Institute, specializing in Russian and Soviet Studies.
Ms. Laber was active in the early development of the human rights movement in the United States. She is one of the founders of Helsinki Watch, which grew to be Human Rights Watch. She served as the Executive Director of Helsinki Watch from 1979 to 1995 and then as Senior Adviser to Human Rights Watch until 2000. She also serves as Executive Director of the International Freedom to Publish Committee of the Association of American Publishers, a post she has held since l977.
Ms. Laber is the author and editor of books and articles, most recently of The Courage of Strangers, a memoir about her human rights work (Public Affairs, 2002). (She is pictured as a teenager on its cover.) She is also the author of A Nation is Dying - Afghanistan Under the Soviets 1979-87 (Northwestern University Press), and of numerous Human Rights Watch publications. Google Books lists 560 items under her name. She has written articles and book reviews that have appeared in newspapers and magazines including The New York Review of Books, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune, The New Republic, Columbia Journalism Review, International Herald Tribune, Problems of Communism, The Slavic Review, and Commentary.
In 2000 Ms. Laber was honored by President Vaclav Havel of the Czech Republic, who presented her with his country’s Medal of Merit. In 2002 she testified against Slobodan Milosevic at his war crimes trial in The Hague. In 2003 she was named “Alumni of the Year” by the Harriman Institute. The Association of American Publishers has named a publishing award in her honor: the Jeri Laber International Freedom to Publish Award.
Ms. Laber is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations in New York City. Ms Laber is the recipient of a Research and Writing Grant from the MacArthur Foundation.
JAMAICA HIGH SCHOOL NOTEWORTHY ALUMNI : : : : : : : : 11/24/08