Bio
Fermín L. Arraiza Navas is a Puerto Rican lawyer with over 30 years of experience, focused on the defense of human rights. Born and raised in Puerto Rico, he earned a bachelor's degree in Political Science from the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus. He obtained his Juris Doctor degree from the Interamerican University of Puerto Rico, where he also served as the director of the Law Review, the institution's academic publication.
After graduating, he worked at the law firm Nazario & Santiago/Abogados Asociados, focusing on civil practice and civil rights defense. In 1994, he received a scholarship to pursue a master's degree in International Law at the Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law in Sweden. Following his master's, he volunteered at the United Nations Centre for Human Rights in Switzerland.
He returned to Puerto Rico in 1996 and taught courses on international law and human rights at the Interamerican University of Puerto Rico School of Law.
During a critical period (1999-2003), Arraiza Navas directed the Special Commission to Address the Situation in Vieques for the Puerto Rico Bar Association and presented claims regarding human rights violations before the UN Human Rights Commission and the Human Rights Council. He has also been a collaborator with the American Association of Jurists in international forums.
Between 2003 and 2018, he worked for the Civil Action and Education Corporation and was in private practice, in addition to continuing to teach university courses. He has been the legal director of ACLU of Puerto Rico since January 2019, continuing his work in the defense of civil and human rights.
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