Merilin Kiviorg
Dr. Merilin Kiviorg (DPhil Oxford, mag iur Tartu, BA Tartu) is a Senior Research Fellow in Public International Law at the University of Tartu School of Law. She obtained her doctorate as well as taught international law, including human rights at the University of Oxford in 2002-2014. She was a Max Weber Fellow at the European University Institute in Florence. Merilin has served as an advisor on human rights for a number of non-governmental and governmental bodies. She is a member of the Panel of Experts on Freedom of Religion or Belief of the OSCE/ODIHR and member of the Chancellor of Justice’s Human Rights Advisory Board in Estonia.
She is one of the principal investigators in the Tartu University project “The Evolution of Human Rights Law and Discourse in the Russian Federation, and its Interaction with Human Rights in Europe and the World”. Merilin teaches courses on comparative human rights, public international law and a course on law, religion and politics. Her primary research interests are religion and human rights, religion and law, human rights and security. She is the author of multiple articles and books in the listed fields.
She is the author of Religion and Law in Estonia (Kluwer Law International, 2011, 2nd edition 2016). Her publications include ‘Dangers of the Changing Narrative of Human Rights – Why Democracy and Security need Religious Freedom’ in Rex Ahdar (Ed.). Research Handbook on Law and Religion (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2018); ‘Collective Religious Autonomy versus Individual Rights: A Challenge for the ECtHR?’ (2014) 39 Review of Central and East European Law (Brill). She has published articles including in the Emory International Law Review, Review of Central and East European Law (Brill) and Juridica International and has contributed with multiple chapters to books published, e.g. by Routledge, Springer, Brill. She is the editor and co-author of the Securitization of Religious Freedom – Religion and Scope of State Control (ECCSR, Editorial Comares, 2019, forthcoming).