Monday, June 27, 2011

Fellowship at the Urban Justice Center's Iraqi Refugee Assistance Project

The Urban Justice Center's Iraqi Refugee Assistance Project ("IRAP")  is looking to sponsor a law student for public interest fellowships for the year 2012-2013. Fellows will be based in New York City, with the opportunity to travel to the Middle East to do on the ground legal work and fact-finding.

IRAP conducts legal advocacy on behalf of Iraqi refugees who were displaced as a result of the Iraq War and its aftermath. IRAP is primarily student-driven: it was founded at Yale Law School in September of 2008, and now has chapters at nine U.S.-based law schools as well as the University of Jordan Law School in Amman. IRAP teams law students with pro bono supervising attorneys to provide direct legal representation to Iraqi refugees in the Middle East who are in immediate danger, and seeking safe passage to the United States or another resettlement country. Individual legal representation of refugees is a near area of law that IRAP is working to create through its legal work, relying on a combination of immigration law, refugee law, international law and administrative law to address this cutting-edge legal issue.

IRAP's clientele include Iraqi refugees most in need of urgent assistance, including women who are victims of trafficking, children with medical emergencies, interpreters who worked with the United States military and survivors of torture. In addition to legal representation, IRAP advocates with the Departments of State and Homeland Security to improve refugee processing procedures, as well as with members of Congress.

The primary duties of the legal fellow will include supervising individual cases, developing and conducting trainings for students and attorneys, facilitating advocacy amongst relevant stakeholders, developing academic content for IRAP's clinical program at the University of Jordan as well as emerging clinical programs in the United States, and coordinating fact-finding research in the U.S. and the Middle East surrounding particularly vulnerable populations of refugees. Additionally, the legal fellow will assist with legal research, and ongoing litigation efforts, to further develop a system of individual representation in the area of refugee law.

IRAP is seeking an enthusiastic law student or recent graduate with strong legal research and writing skills. The ideal candidate is innovative and interested in creative approaches to the urgent legal and humanitarian needs of refugees in the Middle East and elsewhere, as well as able to adapt to different cultural and psychological needs of clients and NGO partners.

For more information about IRAP, please visit www.iraqirefugee.us

Those interested should send a cover letter, resume and brief writing sample to Bheller@iraqirefugee.us.

Due to the anticipated volume of applications, we regret that we may not be able to respond to every submission individually.

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