The Royal Irish Academy’s Standing Committee for International Affairs presents their annual conference focusing on Ireland’s engagement with multilateral institutions, particularly the United Nations themes including human rights, humanitarianism, the UN Security Council, peacemaking, and security issues.

2025 marked 70 years since Ireland joined the United Nations. Through examining Ireland’s engagement across spheres of influence including international law and human rights in the midst of increasing global insecurity, the 2026 International Affairs Conference will provide a platform for practitioners and academics to explore Ireland’s diplomacy and engagement with international institutions in the midst of escalating uncertainty.

The conference seeks to interrogate Ireland’s ongoing commitment to multilateralism, peace-making, consensus building and decisive diplomatic action and consider the impact of the international human rights system on policy making and law reform processes in Ireland. Participants will be asked to consider the ways in which Ireland navigates war, conflict, and the existing international order to foster human rights, security, humanitarian action, and global governance; in addition to championing the rule of law, contributing to, and engaging with, the European Union and other international organisations including the United Nations.

This event is supported by the Department of Foreign Affairs, and we are honoured to announce that the plenary speaker will be Siobhán Mullally, UN Special Rapporteur on Trafficking in Persons, especially women and children, and the Established Professor of Human Rights Law and Director of the Irish Centre for Human Rights at the University of Galway, Ireland.

Schedule

9.00am Registration

9.15am Welcome – Professor Pádraig Carmody (Trinity College Dublin)

9.30am Panel 1: Ireland and the UN. Chair: Mr Colin Wrafter, retired Irish diplomat

• Dr Marie Aronsson-Storrier & Dr Dug Cubie (University College Cork): "Humanitarian Assistance in a Time of Global Insecurity: Ireland’s position on the Proposed UN Convention on the Protection of Persons in the Event of Disasters"
• Dr Catriona Dowd (University College Dublin): "Bridges and Benchmarks: Ireland, Civilian Harm and Diplomatic Logics at the UN Security Council"
• Professor Alanna O'Malley (Erasmus University Rotterdam): "“From Cork to Congo” and from Kilkenny to Kosovo, Lost Histories of Irish peacekeepers as Human Rights actors in ONUC and KFOR."
• Dr Pearce Clancy (Trinity College Dublin): "Rising Tides Raise All Ships?: Irish Engagement in the Peaceful Settlement of International Disputes"

10.40am Coffee break

11.00am Panel 2: Relations with other states. Chair: Dr Shelley Deane (Dublin City University)

• Ms Maria McCloskey (Irish Rule of Law International): "Rights-Based Justice Innovation: Lessons from Ireland’s Engagement in Malawi and Zambia"
• Dr Tamirace Fakhoury (Tufts University): "Ireland’s Conflict Management Repertoire in Messy Peace Processes: Peacekeeping, Diplomacy, and Engagement in Lebanon’s Sectarian Power‑Sharing"
• Dr Shola Shekili (National Aviation Academy of Azerbaijan): "Small State Agency and Multilateral Security Governance in an Era of Global Insecurity"
• Dr Hadiqa Mir (Bahria University Islamabad): "Climate Diplomacy: Ireland’s Strategic Engagement in a Fragmented Global Framework"

12.00pm Address: Mr Thomas Byrne TD, Minister of State for European Affairs and Defence (introduced by Mr Colin Wrafter)

1.00pm Lunch break

2.00pm Keynote: Professor Siobhán Mullally (University of Galway and UN Special Rapporteur) (introduced by Dr Shelley Deane)

3.00pm Roundtable. Chair: Professor Ben Tonra (University College Dublin)

• Dr Catriona Dowd (University College Dublin)
• Professor Alanna O'Malley (Erasmus University Rotterdam) 
• Dr Patricia Lewis (Independent)
• Professor Siobhán Mullally (University of Galway and UN Special Rapporteur)
• Professor Roger Mac Ginty (Durham University)

4.30pm Closing Remarks – Professor Pádraig Carmody

4.45pm Close

6.00pm ISIA Journal Launch and reception in Iveagh House

8.00pm ENDS

Mr Colin Wrafter is a retired Irish diplomat, formerly Ambassador to South Africa and Zimbabwe and Director of the Human Rights Unit in the Department of Foreign Affairs.

Dr Caitriona Dowd is Assistant Professor and Ad Astra Fellow in University College Dublin’s School of Politics and International Relations. Her research focuses on the role of conflict in humanitarian crises, with particular attention to civilian targeting and the weaponisation of food by armed actors. Caitriona currently co-leads a Research Ireland-funded project on the gendered dimensions of hunger in peacebuilding; and an Irish Aid-funded project on social capital and resilience in urban conflict-affected contexts. Her recent work has been published in World Development, Journal of Peace Research, Civil Wars and Journal of Peacebuilding and Development. She holds degrees from the University of Sussex, London School of Economics and Political Science, and Trinity College Dublin. In her previous role as a peace and conflict specialist in the humanitarian sector, Caitriona worked in Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Haiti, Somalia and South Sudan among other contexts.

Professor Alanna O'Malley is Chair of Global Governance and Wealth and Head of Department of History at Erasmus University, Rotterdam. A historian of international relations, she is an expert on the United Nations, decolonization and the Global South. She is an ERC Laureate, having been awarded a Starting Grant as Principal Investigator of the project: ‘Challenging the Liberal World Order from Within, the Invisible History of the United Nations and the Global South'. She held the inaugural Chair in United Nations Studies in Peace and Justice at Leiden University until 2021. She has also published her work widely in leading journals including Humanity, International History Review, Past & Present and Journal of Cold War Studies, among others. She is a regular contributor to national and international media including Al Jazeera, BBC, CNN, The Irish Times and TRT World.

Dr Pearce Clancy is a Research Fellow in Trinity College Dublin’s School of Law, funded by Research Ireland’s Government of Ireland Postdoctoral Fellowship. His current research concerns community interests in international law, and the twin concepts of obligations erga omnes and erga omnes partes. He was previously Assistant Professor of International Human Rights Law in the Irish Centre for Human Rights, University of Galway, and he served as a legal advisor for Al-Haq, the Palestinian human rights organisation. Dr Clancy’s doctoral research at the University of Galway was funded by the Irish Research Council, and during this time he also held the NUI EJ Phelan Fellowship in International Law from 2022 to 2024. A monograph based on his doctoral research, titled ‘Permanent Neutrality in International Law’, is currently under contract with Oxford University Press.

Dr Shelley Deane is a research fellow on the North-South Programme, at the Conflict Institute in the School of Law and Government at Dublin City University (DCU) where she serves as co-editor of Irish Studies in International Affairs for the Analysing and Researching Ireland North and South (ARINS) project. She holds a PhD in Government from the London School of Economics and Political Science. Dr Deane has conducted fieldwork in conflict transformation and peacebuilding in Ireland, the Middle East, North Africa, and the Gulf. Her research examines conflict to peace transitions, cross-border governance and security, deliberative democracy, negotiated peace agreements, and societal transformation.

Ms Maria McCloskey began her career and honed her legal skills in the litigation department at Napier Solicitors in Belfast, where she progressed to the role of Associate Director. A turning point came when she undertook a volunteer placement in Mozambique, sparking a commitment to human rights which has shaped the rest of her career. In 2017, Maria completed a master’s degree in Human Rights Law at Queen’s University, Belfast. Shortly after, she moved out of private practice to work as an Immigration Solicitor at the Children’s Law Centre. She then stepped into leadership positions, first as Director and Solicitor of Public Interest Litigation Support (PILS) in Belfast, and later as Executive Director with Irish Rule of Law International (IRLI). Maria is now leading IRLI through the next stage of its growth and development, with a new five-year strategy published in spring 2026, and strengthening IRLI’s programmes across multiple jurisdictions.

Dr Tamirace Fakhoury is Associate Professor of International Politics and Conflict at the Fletcher School at Tufts University in the US. Her work engages with the politics of refuge and migration in complex conflict environments. Her research also explores the politics of power-sharing as a central framework for conflict resolution after war. She also studies the role of multilateral actors such as the European Union in shaping global responses to conflict. Before joining Fletcher, she was Associate Professor at Aalborg University in its Copenhagen Campus (Denmark), and a visiting Professor as well as the Kuwait Chair at Sciences Po in Paris. Prior to this, Tamirace was based at the Lebanese American University in Beirut/Byblos where she directed the Institute for Social Justice and Conflict Resolution.

Dr Shola Shekili is an Associate Professor at the Department of Aviation Security at the National Aviation Academy of Azerbaijan. She holds a PhD in radiation materials science and has been working in the field of aviation security since 2003, with over two decades of professional experience in behavioural profiling and threat detection. Her interdisciplinary background allows her to integrate physical sciences, risk modelling, and behavioural analysis in the study of emerging threats in civil aviation. Her research focuses on digital radicalization, insider threats, and AI-enabled manipulation. Dr. Shekili has published in international peer-reviewed journals and actively contributes to research on aviation security governance, crisis communication, and advanced threat detection. Her current work explores the implications of artificial intelligence, including deepfake technologies, for trust, identity verification, and decision-making in safety-critical systems.

Dr Hadiqa Mir is an experienced policy analyst and a passionate researcher with over 9 years of experience working with Pakistan's leading national think tank. She is a PhD scholar in international relations. She is a published author with numerous contributions to academic journals and policy reports. She is an expert on international relations, frequently writing for national and international newspapers and giving her insights to the leading think tanks through roundtable discussions and policy papers. With a deep commitment to advancing policy research and global affairs, she combines academic excellence with practical experience to influence policy discourse at national and international levels.

Professor Ben Tonra is a Full Professor of International Relations at the UCD School of Politics and International Relations. He teaches, researches, and publishes in European foreign, security, and defence policy, Irish foreign, security, and defence policy, and International Relations theory. Tonra has served as the chair of the Royal Irish Academy's Standing Committee on International Affairs and is a Distinguished Fellow at the Azure Forum. He has also worked at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington DC and has been involved with various think tanks and organizations in Ireland and abroad.

Dr Patricia M. Lewis is an independent expert on international security, focusing primarily on arms control and disarmament and technology. Her previous roles included: Research Director, International Security at Chatham House in London; Deputy Director and Scientist-in-Residence at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies; Director of the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR); and Director of VERTIC in London. Dr Lewis served on: the 2004-6 WMD Commission, chaired by Dr. Hans Blix; the 2010-2011 Advisory Panel on Future Priorities of the OPCW, chaired by Ambassador Rolf Ekeus; an Advisor to the 2008-10 International Commission on Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament (ICNND) chaired by Gareth Evans and Yoriko Kawaguchi; Commissioner on the 2014-2016 Global Commission on Internet Governance chaired by Carl Bildt. She is on the Governing Board of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), on the Space Advisory Board for the EU Special Envoy for Space in EEAS, and she is co-Chair of the Scientific Advisory Group for the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). She holds a BSc (Hons) in physics from Manchester University, a PhD in nuclear physics from Birmingham University and an Honorary Doctor of Laws from the University of Warwick. She was a visiting lecturer in physics at Imperial College London and was an Elizabeth Poppleton Fellow at the Australian National University She is a dual national of the UK and Ireland. Dr Lewis is the recipient of the American Physical Society’s 2009 Joseph A. Burton Forum Award recognizing "outstanding contributions to the public understanding or resolution of physics" and a recipient of Ireland’s Presidential Distinguished Service Award in 2023.

About the Royal Irish Academy

The Royal Irish Academy (RIA), established in 1785, is an all-island, independent learned society and academic body that champions research by supporting and promoting scholarship in the sciences, humanities and social sciences. Its elected membership of approximately 680 individuals and 80 staff represent Ireland internationally, provide expert advice to government, carry out research, administer research grants, organise conferences and public lectures, publish academic books and journals, and maintain a research library.

Eolas faoi Acadamh Ríoga na hÉireann

Is cumann léannta neamhspleách, uile-oileáin é Acadamh Ríoga na hÉireann, a bunaíodh sa bhliain 1785. Tacaíonn an tAcadamh le scoláireacht agus taighde sna heolaíochtaí, sna daonnachtaí agus sna heolaíochtaí sóisialta. Tá tuairim is 680 comhalta tofa ann agus 80 ball foirne, agus déanann siadionadaíocht ar son na hÉireann go hidirnáisiúnta, cuireann siad comhairle shaineolach ar fáil don rialtas, déanann siad taighde, déanann siad deontais taighde a riaradh, eagraíonn siad comhdhálacha agus léachtaí poiblí, cuireann siad leabhair agus irisí acadúla i gcló, agus déanann siad cúram de leabharlann taighde.

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