Former UP Law Dean and former ICC Judge Raul C. Pangalangan was recently appointed to head a Commission of Inquiry at the International Labour Organization (ILO).

The Commission of Inquiry is ILO’s highest-level investigative procedure under its Constitution, and is generally set up when a member State is accused of committing persistent and serious violations and has repeatedly refused to address them. Since the ILO’s founding in 1919, it has created only fourteen such Commissions.

In March this year, the ILO Governing Body established a Commission of Inquiry to consider the complaint concerning non-observance by Myanmar of the Forced Labour Convention, 1930 (No. 29) and the Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87).

The ILO Governing Body, at its 345th Session in June 2022, appointed Judge Pangalangan as Chairperson for the Commission of Inquiry. He was recently sworn into office in Geneva by ILO Director-General Guy Ryder.

Judge Pangalangan will continue to teach at the UP College of Law, where he currently teaches Public International Law. His book PHILIPPINE MATERIALS IN INTERNATIONAL LAW was published in November 2021 by BRILL. His essay Judicial Review at the Asian Development Bank Administrative Tribunal was recently published in 12 ASIAN J. INTERNATIONAL LAW 248–258 (2022). His essay On Böckenförde’s “A Christian in the Office of Constitutional Judge” will appear in the JOURNAL OF LAW AND RELIGION, published by the Cambridge University Press.